STAY HUMAN (2019)

I saw the Beatnigs play once and thought they were great. Unique and confrontational in the best way. And I really liked the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy album when it came out, although you could argue it was more of a dissertation than an LP. I still love the lyric: "Sometimes I feel like a socio-genetic experiment, a Petri dish community's token of affection. You see, I'm African, Native American, Irish and German. I was adopted by parents who loved me; they were the same color as the kids who called me n***** on the walk home from school. I cried until I found out what it meant. Then I got me some equipment, my fists man. I was a hitman with no friends." I thought the first Spearhead album was decent, but didn't like the second one much, outside of Why Oh Why (The Basketball Song), which is an amazing song. After that, I kinda lost track of what Franti was up to.

This movie is not a straight documentary about him, which I think would be a better movie. It tells some of his story, but is mostly centered around Franti visiting with a few different people in different parts of the world and telling their stories. This is obviously set up to pull the tears out of you, in addition to highlighting some cool things. The guy dying of ALS was was particularly a tough story and was well done.

Despite this being somewhat obvious and blunt, and at times seeming like a Travel Channel show, it was pretty well done. Now I'm wondering if there is anything Franti has done over the last 20 years that I should check out.