You are here:

Stop for Bud

Name: Stop for Bud
Director: Ole John, Jens Jørgen Thorsen, Jørgen Leth
Released: 1963
Duration: 12 min

Representation Score

7.8/10

Good

1963

Director

Ole John, Jens Jørgen Thorsen, Jørgen Leth

Runtime

12 minutes

Average Rating

No ratings yet

New Showbiz Analysis

Stop for Bud is a striking experimental documentary that disrupts traditional cinematic conventions. Its greatest achievement is centering the Black experience through Bud Powell and Dexter Gordon, providing a rare level of racial ability to act for 1963. The film succeeds in portraying an artist as a non-conformist figure who exists outside standard social expectations. This focus on individualistic, fragmented identity allows for a nuanced, if indirect, exploration of mental presence and neurodivergence. However, the film remains limited by its narrow focus on a singular masculine experience. The lack of female presence and explicit queer identity keeps the representation of gender and sexuality within a more traditional, albeit experimental, framework.

Watch this, not that →

Category Breakdown

Does Stop for Bud have LGBTQ+ representation?

Fair

The film focuses on the solitary experience of Bud Powell, exploring intimacy with the environment through experimental separation of image and sound. While it doesn't explicitly depict queer identities, it offers a non-traditional exploration of relationships and surroundings.

How does Stop for Bud portray gender?

Fair

This documentary centers on a male subject and includes male narration. It operates within a male-dominated jazz subculture, offering little visible role for women or challenges to gender hierarchies.

How racially and ethnically diverse is Stop for Bud?

Excellent

The film highlights a Black jazz icon within a European context, challenging era-specific norms. Dexter Gordon’s narration emphasizes a Black creative perspective, giving Powell significant influence through his music.

How does Stop for Bud represent religion and culture?

Good

The film portrays the artist outside traditional social structures, celebrating non-conformist existence. It critiques the idea of the disciplined citizen, favoring a subjective, individualistic way of life.

Does Stop for Bud include disability representation?

Fair

The film touches on psychological complexities and mental presence through Powell's 'strange duality.' However, these neurodivergent themes are treated metaphorically rather than through direct advocacy.

Present on Screen

Centers a Black jazz icon in a European setting, providing significant racial ability to act.
Uses Dexter Gordon as a narrator to reinforce a Black creative perspective.
Celebrates non-conformist, individualistic existence over social rigidity.

Limited or Absent

Lacks visible women's ability to drive the story or representation within its jazz subculture.
Does not explicitly depict or center queer identities in the narrative.
Handles disability and neurodivergence metaphorically rather than through direct representation.

Official Synopsis

Stop for Bud is Jørgen Leth's first film and the first in his long collaboration with Ole John. […] they wanted to "blow up cinematic conventions and invent cinematic language from scratch". The jazz pianist Bud Powell moves around Copenhagen -- through King's Garden, along the quay at Kalkbrænderihavnen, across a waste dump. […] Bud is alone, accompanied only by his music. […] Image and sound are two different things -- that's Leth's and John's principle. Dexter Gordon, the narrator, tells stories about Powell's famous left hand. In an obituary for Powell, dated 3 August 1966, Leth wrote: "He quite willingly, or better still, unresistingly, mechanically, let himself be directed. The film attempts to depict his strange duality about his surroundings. His touch on the keys was like he was burning his fingers -- that's what it looked like, and that's how it sounded. But outside his playing, and often right in the middle of it, too, he was simply gone, not there."

How are these scores produced? →