A king of AM radio in the US and stalwart of the Spotify playlists of anyone with a taste for solid, four-square old-school rock, Tom Petty died seven years ago this month – but his estate must surely be earning royalties every minute of every day from hits such as American Girl, Refugee and I Won’t Back Down. It’s perhaps strange that for all his musical success he has less of an afterlife as a physical entity, but this sweet documentary may alleviate that a little.
It was shot in 1982-83 around the time Petty and his band the Heartbreakers had just finished their album Long After Dark and were starting to tour again. A prismatic collage of archive clips, interview snippets and goofing off, the package was directed by Doug Dowdle, Phil Savenick and Cameron Crowe. The last was then an ace reporter for Rolling Stone who appears on camera here interviewing Petty well before he would transition into becoming a director of features including Say Anything, Almost Famous, Jerry Maguire and Vanilla Sky. Somehow the 16mm reels of this film were lost somewhere along the way and have recently been discovered, remastered and supplemented by unseen extra footage that was never shown when the film was originally shown on MTV in the 80s. So there’s a lot to get nostalgic about here for Petty, Heartbreakers and even Crowe fans, as well as anyone who grooves to vintage LA 80s fashion. Petty’s skinny-jeans-tucked-into-cowboy-boots look is certainly a trip, as are the fluffy mullets on the band.
Of course, the music is the main attraction and that’s served well, with long chunks of performance footage that aren’t sliced and diced as much as they would be in a contemporary rock doc. There’s also a juicy clip of Petty almost getting mauled at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco by over-enthusiastic fans who pull him off the stage, which just goes to underscore how much tighter security is these days. Ah, the good old days.
• Tom Petty: Heartbreakers Beach Party is in cinemas on 17 October and 20 October.
