You get the sense that Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson really loves the subjects he’s making documentaries about. It’s not that other directors don’t, but there’s a sense of discovery and exuberance in even his lines of questioning. Thompson, longtime drummer for the Roots and the Tonight Show band, previously made an exciting portrait of Sly and the Family Stone, as well as the Oscar-winning Summer of Soul, about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival.
Now he turns his attention to the legendary funk band Earth, Wind and Fire, which lends its name to the title of Thompson’s film. It dutifully traces the band’s rise, fall and eventual rebirth and shows how their enduring songs like “September,” “Boogie Wonderland” and “Shining Star” were made with soul, energy and sparkling musicianship.
Of course I knew the hits, but I didn’t know much about the band’s story, and it begins with bandleader Maurice White, who emerges as the film’s true subject. He grew up in racially segregated Memphis and as a child was abandoned by his single mother. He found solace in music, becoming a session drummer for legendary Chicago record label Chess and later performed with jazz great Ramsey Lewis.
When White reconnected with his mother years later, she had started a new family without him, and his half-siblings would later join Earth, Wind and Fire. In the late ’60s, White became fascinated with metaphysics, astrology and mysticism, and he saw the band as a way to advocate for his ideals while celebrating Black identity.
The lineup of Earth, Wind and Fire was always revolving, but they always crowded the stage with at least 9 or 10 members. The band’s early fusion of freeform jazz, experimental R&B and African rhythms developed by the mid-’70s into a more radio-friendly sound. And in the years leading up to the disco boom, Earth, Wind and Fire was scoring No. 1 hits, multiplatinum albums and sold-out tours.
Earth, Wind and Fire is the most conventional of Questlove’s musical portraits, until it isn’t. The most compelling stretch of the film begins at the band’s peak, when White is pouring millions of dollars into elaborate arena shows that involve pyrotechnics, synchronized dancing and magic tricks. As with all success narratives, there must be a comedown, and the second act of Earth, Wind and Fire’s story is filled with betrayals, disappointments and reconciliations.
The documentary’s lengthy subtitle, To Be Celestial vs. the Weight of the World, reflects the contradictions of Maurice White himself; the joy of his music belied the tensions and infidelities behind it. Like Sly Stone, White was brilliant, tenacious and difficult, and this is another of Thompson’s considerations of the joy and complexities of Black art: how it’s formed, how it’s commodified, how it persists.
We’ve gotten tons of these documentaries in the streaming era, and Earth, Wind and Fire is neither a revelation nor a radical reworking of the form. But it’s better than most, driven by the undeniable buoyancy of its music and complicated by the fascinating, mysterious man who created it.
Nathan Weinbender is a co-host of Spokane Public Radio’s “Movies 101” heard Friday evenings at 6:30 and Saturday afternoons at 2 on KPBX.