From Dig! to Anvil , rock-docs often revel in tour-bus turmoil. Tom Berninger’s droll, honest snapshot of his brother Matt’s band The National upends such rock’n’roll clichés. When Matt takes Tom on tour as a roadie, the band seem level-headed. Metal-head Tom, mind, is a booze-gurgling liability – the kind who mislays the guest-list when Werner Herzog’s on it.
Like Spinal Tap remixed by Alexander Payne, what emerges from this sly inversion of rock myth is an affecting, hilarious portrait of chalk/cheese sibling love, with a sweet twist: Tom thinks he’s a loser, but his film is a winning one-off.
