Fantastic!

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Well - Well - Well!.... Surprise! Surprise! Not being at all a fan of Alice Cooper (the band) or Alice Cooper (the manufactured stage persona) - I certainly was all set to dislike this "Jekyll & Hyde" rockumentary, big-time. I really was. And, with that, most likely give this show a measly 2-star rating, at best.But - Hey! - As it turned out - Due to this production having a really talented writing/directing team behind it (who were a trio of Canadian dudes) - I found "Super Duper Alice Cooper" to be genuinely entertaining, for the most part.Yep. This rockumentary was a very slick and polished presentation that moved along smoothly as an impressive and colourful collage of retro film clips.Born Vincent Furnier (1948) - This fast-paced, 85-minute rockumentary told the tale of young Vincent's ambitious rise to rock'n'roll fame as he struggled to be different from all the rest - Eventually morphing into a trashy, theatrical stage personality who promoted sex, death & violence.Ah-yes! But there certainly was a price to be paid for Vincent/Alice's meteoric rise to super-stardom..... Be sure to watch this DVD to find out what price Alice paid for fame & fortune.

Although it featured some great film footage of the early band, the story of Alice Cooper as told here is a miserable whitewash and a complete insult to fans of the band. Glen Buxton gets little mention and no credit; Michael Bruce doesn't even get mentioned. Not even once. How can you tell the story of this band and leave them out of it? Answer: you tell the story as if Alice Cooper (the individual) was the only person who really mattered and the rest of the band just happened to be there in the beginning. (I don't understand how Dennis Dunaway could have participated so much in this without feeling like a complete traitor to the rest of the band.) Basically this smells like somebody's manager trying to sweep history under a rug while polishing his client's reputation for all of the fans who arrived after "Welcome to My Nightmare." As the documentary rolled on and it became ever more clear what a nice, quiet hatchet-job this was, Alice's la-di-da narration really started to grate on me. (I know: that isn't exactly thoughtful or deeply analytical criticism, but I found myself increasingly outraged by this travesty.) A highly disingenuous presentation.

Probably because Bruce wrote a devastating book about his experiences in the band, and that he had written a lot of the material for the songs and that Alice 'abandoned them' after "Muscle Of Love" sessions were recorded. I think he's had an ax to grind with them ever since. Can't say I totally blame him either. He isn't even mentioned at the end of the film as if he didn't even exist.Buxton was barely mentioned at all and not having an RIP at the end had to have been deliberate slap in the face on the filmmaker's part. Maybe Buxton was as bitter over the whole thing as Bruce was and the producers of this film followed the input from the management. Some kind of fallout occurred for this to happenNot to mention, everything is done in voice-over and we don't get to see the participants as they are today. The scenes are done in that CGI diorama overlay style which is fine in some cases but I think overused here.Overall, a not very satisfying documentary. 3 out of 10 for these glaring omissions.

Over the last forty-plus years Alice Cooper has found himself answering the same questions in interviews and thus he often repeats the same anecdotes. Thankfully the makers of Super Duper Alice Cooper, two of which were responsible for the excellent documentaries Metal: A Headbanger's Journey and the underrated Global Metal, have decided to approach the subject from a different angle.Instead of following the traditional interview route by merely featuring Cooper on-screen talking about different parts of his career, Cooper himself narrates the story, starting with the formation of his Beatles spoof band the Earwigs in the mid-1960s and their through the brief time as the Spiders, before eventually settling on the name Alice Cooper.Everything is covered here; their arrival in Los Angeles to find a city of free love and LSD, something which they sought to challenge with their outrageous brand of rock 'n' roll; the band's rise to success and how Cooper found himself in the spotlight; the group's split and Cooper's descent into alcoholism as he struggled to keep the character of Alice at bay while launching a solo career.The documentary comes to an end following the Nightmare Returns tour of 1986. Fans may have wished for the filmmakers to continue through his success with Trash and Hey Stoopid, the rediscovery of his faith in the early 1990s and his evolution into heavier metal with Brutal Planet in 2000, but the movie ends on a perfect note so this is not a flaw.Instead of showing the interviewees on-screen, Super Duper Alice Cooper incorporates the technique of animating photographs in a similar way to Matt Harlock and Paul Thomas 2009 documentary American: The Bill Hicks Story, while also including stock footage from classic movies such as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, old films of the band and footage taken from TV.This is a unique and entertaining approach to telling the story of an iconic artist that, in one form or another, has been told several times before. Super Duper Alice Cooper is a must for any fan.