The Soul of a Man

6.4 / 10

(21 votes)

In "The Soul of A Man," director Wim Wenders looks at the dramatic tension in the blues between the sacred and the profane by exploring the music and lives of three of his favorite blues artists: Skip James, Blind Willie Johnson and J. B. Lenoir. Part history, part personal pilgrimage, the film tells the story of these lives in music through an extended fictional film sequence (recreations of '20s and '30s events - shot in silent-film, hand-crank style), rare archival footage, present-day documentary scenes and covers of their songs by contemporary musicians such as Shemekia Copeland, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Garland Jeffreys, Chris Thomas King, Cassandra Wilson, Nick Cave, Los Lobos, Eagle Eye Cherry, Vernon Reid, James "Blood" Ulmer, Lou Reed, Bonnie Raitt, Marc Ribot, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Lucinda Williams and T-Bone Burnett.

Country:

Germany,

United States of America

Genre:

Documentary,

Music

Duration:

103 minutes

Year:

2003

Director:

Wim Wenders

Cast:
Laurence Fishburne

Self - Narrator

Chris Thomas King

Blind Willie Johnson

Keith B. Brown

Skip James

J.B. Lenoir

Self (archive footage)

Skip James

Self (archive footage)

Crew:
Mathilde Bonnefoy

Editor

Margaret Bodde

Producer

Wim Wenders

Director

Lisa Rinzler

Director of Photography

Paul Marcus

Line Producer