Is This Desire?

Stories from the Road: Following PJ Harvey is a triumph of spunk over ineptitude. At an hour long, the documentary owes much to reality television, in that the stars—the three filmmakers, Kyle Keyser, Amanda Mazur, and Bill Raisor—have no script to follow but a common goal in mind. And, like reality TV, Stories from the Road owes much of its success to the easygoing charm of its protagonists.

The film follows the conveniently named trio through five European cities and four U.S. ones, as they attempt to meet PJ Harvey and, as Amanda states early on, to get laid. "We should have two missions," she says, "in case one falls through." Quite accidentally, Kyle cast the film perfectly: Amanda is consistently witty; Bill is talk, dark, handsome, and an excellent foil for the other two (especially given that he'd never even heard of PJ Harvey until meeting Kyle and Amanda, a few months before the movie was made); and Kyle himself is the archetypal fanboy. Despite his easy patter with Bill and Amanda, he's so totally in awe of Harvey that it's hard to imagine what he'd say to her, should he meet her.

And therein lies the film's tension. Will they meet her or won't they? Does she even know there's a trio of twenty- and thirtysomething Americans buddying up to her band and crew? This question hangs deliciously over the proceedings and, as a result, when an ailing Harvey cancels the rest of her European tour halfway through the movie, Stories from the Road loses much of its steam. The film crew finishes out its itinerary, traveling dejectedly from Madrid to Lisbon where they drink, mope, and buy shoes. But when Harvey announces East Coast dates, the film gets its sense of purpose back. The crew shows more confidence in the latter part of the movie, and a few moments are quite stirring: At a sound check, Harvey performs a folk song with minimal accompaniment, and her voice sounds thin and fragile in the huge hall; and Sept. 11 shows up, but is thankfully not exploited as anything other than a particularly moving plot point.

Something else about the film changes in the States, as well. By the time Kyle and Amanda film the first of two New York gigs, Kyle has actually figured out how to record concert audio. From that point on, we get a lot of live songs. This, as my housemate put it, is fine if you like PJ Harvey. But by the third live song ("The Sky Lit Up," recorded in Boston), it does seem a bit like the filmmakers are just showing off, and possibly passing time.

But Stories from the Road is a nice ride. It's likely that viewers will come out of it wanting to do something absurd, inspired by Kyle and Co.'s adventure, or maybe just, as Ann Magnuson once sang, "Take your boyfriend to Europe/ 'cause you know he's never been there."