FILTER SCREEN
Stone immaculate
Questlove questions the systems that destroyed a revolutionary star.
By Grayson Haver Currin.
I want to take you higher: funk-soul revolutionary Sly Stone in action at the Harlem Cultural Festival, 1969; (left) director Questlove and producer Joseph Patel talk shop.
Alamy
Sly Lives! (AKA The Burden Of Black Genius)
★★★★
Dir: Ahmir ‘Questlove’ Thompson
HULU/DISNEY+. ST
L ATE INTO Sly Lives!, Ahmir ‘Questlove’ Thompson’s thoughtful documentary about the explosive brilliance of Sly Stone and the band he built, the drummer and filmmaker poses a provocative question to his assembled celebrities: “Is there a burden on black genius?” Nearly two hours earlier, the film begins with a fruitless quest to define that term before implicitly offering Stone as one possible answer: a charismatic multi-instrumental wonder who channelled the fractures and possibilities of the late ’60s into anthems that recombined most everything. D’Angelo – who emerges as a kind of one-man Greek chorus, so crucial for Sly Lives! – is the first to answer: “You do have to do it for everyone, and everybody else’s success rides on your success.” Thompson’s film does not shy away from such larger cultural vexations and social quandaries, be they racism, addiction, privilege, or mental health disorders. The basics of Stone’s story, after all, can seem like the standard fare of rock star rise-and-fall: a spirited kid with religious roots slips into the psychedelic scene of San Francisco, builds a mighty band with flair and finesse, and then succumbs to the excesses of success but somehow survives to become a grinning grandfather. (Stone, 81, is not interviewed, but Thompson does use recent candid photos of him, proof that his smile still electrifies.) Thompson does not pretend there are easy answers or ready fixes but instead lets his worries unspool into the present, crossing out the eyes of black artists like Lauryn Hill and Dave Chappelle on-screen as Vernon Reid asks, “Who do you think you are? What do you think you’re doing?” In 2025 in the United States, those points retain a cruel power – and afford Sly Lives! a bittersweet staying power.