blur: To the End

It gets a little bit Spinal Tap-py.

Director Toby L takes a straightforward fly-on-the-wall approach – candid, handheld footage, with no cosy talking-head input from collaborators or commentators... There is the feeling of a group willing to let the director test their boundaries.

In place of the long-gone messiness that made Starshaped so compelling is a geezerish sentimental sheen, a look-how-far-we’ve-come self-regarding awe, which chimes with the title song but wears thin over 105 minutes rather than three.

Out front and backstage, this illuminating but not quite revelatory documentary shows a vulnerable, exhausted Blur and the band at their best. Interesting to casual fans, essential for devotees.

It swerves formal interviews in favour of moments of friendship, joy, melancholia and reflection that transcend the ‘for the fans’ framework of a typical album/tour film and becomes something more meaningful.

An honest, funny and disarmingly intimate glimpse into one of the greatest British bands of all time

To the End is more than just a making of: it accompanies the band members in their rehearsals and their conversations, we sneak into their houses, we get to know their hangovers, and we swim with them on cold beaches... [Full review in Spanish]

The band that said “modern life is rubbish” 31 years ago are still working out what it all means, and it’s fascinating to watch them.

The film certainly proves singularly uninterested in offering any historical context that might help explain where Blur came from musically, why they became as big as they did, and how they've managed to keep evolving creatively.

If this is The End, what a way to go out.