Riveting, multi-textured, intensely moving documentary about a
musician whose confrontational drag-queen persona and riotous
hedonism got him into all sorts of trouble. Benjamin is an eccentric,
charismatic screen presence: often irresistibly funny and
perceptive, sometimes rambling, but never less than fascinating -
much like his music, an inspired punk blues potent enough to blow away
Michael Stipe and Patti Smith, who appears in the film. Co-directors
Cohen and Sillen succeed in giving Benjamin a voice - "I wouldn't
want to be different just so things could be less difficult!" -
while remaining unflinchingly honest about the contradictions and
price of his kind of freedom.
