‘Pavements’ Review – Alex Ross Perry Hilariously Reinvents Indie Rock Legends

Writer-director Alex Ross Perry is not a filmmaker who does things the “easy way.” From his black comedies like The Color Wheel and Listen Up Philip, to the intentionally abrasive Her Smell, and even his work writing Christopher Robin, a film that brings Winnie-the-Pooh characters into the real world, Perry is not someone who could ever be accused of being formulaic. But that’s never been more true than in his absurdly convoluted and ingeniously crafted music documentary (sort of), Pavements. The indie slacker rock band Pavement is also a band that didn’t take the conventional route to success, making Perry and Pavement a match made in lo-fi heaven, with director and band matching each other’s weirdness to great effect.

What Is ‘Pavements’ About?

After breaking up publicly in 1999, and then reuniting temporarily in 2010 for another tour, Pavement had another reunion in 2022, for the 30th anniversary of their landmark debut album, Slanted and Enchanted. As the band gets back together for the first time in years, Perry documents them navigating each other as they practice for another tour, while also creating a chronological look back at the act’s history in a fairly standard documentary format. But…that’s just one part of Pavements.

To also mark this occasion, Perry has made a series of other absurd celebrations and tributes. One of these comes in the form of a New York pop-up Pavement Museum dedicated to the band, complete with fake gold records on the walls, ludicrous displays—including one that showcases their mud-covered clothes from a disastrous Lollapalooza performance in 1995—and performances by bands like Snail Mail, Soccer Mommy, and Speedy Ortiz, covering their favorite Pavements songs.

Perry also creates a jukebox stage musical, entitled Slanted! Enchanted!, which forms Pavement’s songs into an unusual narrative, complete with performances by Zoe Lister-Jones and American Idiot’s Michael Esper. As the movie says, with Slanted! Enchanted!, they’re basically taking unserious, slacker songs, and throwing them into one of the most earnest types of art there is. Especially when the film focuses on the making of Slanted! Enchanted!, it feels akin to if Nathan Fielder attempted to make a musical, and the quick reaction shots of Perry throughout show he almost can’t believe they’re doing this in the first place.

But maybe best of all is the attempt to make a big-budget biopic about the band, entitled Range Life, starring Joe Keery as Pavement lead singer Stephen Malkmus, and with Fred Hechinger, Nat Wolff, Griffin Newman, and Logan Miller fleshing out the rest of the band, along with Jason Schwartzman and Tim Heidecker making appearances. It’s in these segments where Pavements is clearly having the most fun, as Perry has taken some extreme liberties with this narrative, and then counterbalances them with the true stories via the documentary parts of the film. For example, after the aforementioned mudslinging Lollapalooza performance, the faux biopic implies how mad the band was at each other, ready to break apart. However, the documentary footage shows how hilarious the band found the situation, laughing in the green room at its ridiculousness.

These segments of the film especially work because of its parody of actors who get too deep into their performances in films like this. Keery sits alone in front of a projector as he obsessively watches and rewatches footage of Malkmus to nail his performance. He even goes to a coach to try to match his vocal fry, only later to regret the decision after realizing he can’t easily get rid of the way he sounds. All the actors take this “film” very seriously, and them playing these parts completely straight-faced, even though we know it’s all bullshit, only makes it funnier.

‘Pavements’ Somehow Manages to Balance All Its Different Elements Perfectly

Combining these four tributes to Pavement into one film could’ve been a real mess, but Perry bounces back and forth from these ideas beautifully, with each wild idea leading to something equally intriguing. In doing so, Perry creates a film that feels just as ridiculous as something the band Pavement would make themselves. It’s unconventional and unpredictable, and that’s the way a movie about Pavement should be.

When introducing the film at the Virginia Film Festival, Perry said that he’s often inspired by things that look like shit to him, and it’s endlessly entertaining to watch the director play around in forms that he’d otherwise likely never touch. Here, he can make a musical biopic that works to both illustrate aspects of the bands, while also parodying how formulaic and over-the-top these types of movies can be. He can make what is for the most part a fairly straightforward documentary, yet by infusing all these other aspects into this one film, it becomes something far more experimental and delightful. In a way, he’s making films that he’d never usually do, and turning them into a movie that feels decidedly as ambitious and strange as the rest of his work.

Pavements also works as a great entry point for those who don’t know Pavement (although complete novices might be a bit overwhelmed by the great references being made throughout), and a delight for those who are well-versed in the band’s material and sense of humor. Perry shows what makes these songs so essential, calling them the most important and influential band in the world, and going album by album, showcasing what made each of them in their small but long-lasting discography so integral then and now. Yet for those who know the band’s work in and out, Pavements is a treasure trove of inside jokes, layers of sarcasm, and wild details. The fact that a film can do so much, yet remain accessible to fans and newbies alike (and not be like four hours long) is an unbelievable accomplishment.

Like Will Lovelace and Dylan Southern’s look at the garage rock era of the early 2000s in Meet Me in the Bathroom, or Todd Haynes’ The Velvet Underground from 2021, Pavements is a perfect blend of filmmaker and artist, knowing exactly how to match the tone of the musical subject. Perry’s work in Pavements is one of the wildest and unhinged approaches to a music documentary ever made, but the fact that he pulls it all together into something that isn’t a mess is a testament to Perry’s craft.

Pavements screened at the 2024 Virginia Film Festival. It is scheduled for a 2025 release.