Pearl Jam – Twenty

You need to be a devoted Pearl Jam fan to last the course of this new doc on the Seattle grunge act. At two hours, it's a long haul, especially if you don't subscribe to the group's clichéd, overly earnest brand of hair-swinging heavy rock. This film is not a patch on a far superior recent documentary about The Kings of Leon ('Talihina Sky'), but Cameron Crowe's scattershot film is at least a pretty comprehensive resumé of the five-piece's 21-year rise to fame.

There are lots of shaky, grainy handheld archive footage and recent interviews, as well as plenty of live material to keep fans happy. The group has endured its fair share of controversy, and these episodes are lovingly addressed: the death by overdose of their first singer (of Pearl Jam's precursor, Mother Love Bone), their well-documented mud fight with Ticketmaster whom they felt were overcharging fans for their concerts and the tragic death of nine fans during a crush at Denmark's Roskilde Festival in 2000.

Granted, Pearl Jam has bundles of on-stage energy. Singer Eddie Vedder (no Kurt Cobain) often goes into a trance-like state, climbing lighting rigs to perilous heights before freefalling metres onto the crowd below. Just a shame the notes used in their dirge-like songs are mostly in the wrong order.