Review: 'Zappa' documentary captures the music and the perfectionism of Frank Zappa

It’s not likely there will be another documentary about Frank Zappa, the iconic and iconoclastic rocker, considering both he and the keeper of his legend, his wife Gail, are now departed — so “Zappa” will serve as the definitive look at the musician’s legacy and prickly personality.

The movie is directed by Alex Winter — yes, Bill from “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.” But deep-six your preconceptions and read the guy’s IMDb profile. He’s got a solid resumé as a director of music videos, TV movies, TV shows, and documentaries on such far-ranging topics as the Panama Papers corruption case and the rise of cryptocurrency.

Winter seems to have plowed through many hours of video of Zappa’s performances, interviews and random bits, and emerged through the other end with a thorough accounting of his career.

The story starts near the end, with the last time Zappa played guitar in public. It was 1991 in Prague, and Zappa was invited by the fledgling democratic government of Czechoslovakia’s president, Vaclav Havel, two years after the departure of the ruling Communists. Havel and his countrymen saw Zappa as a symbol of artistic freedom — and the rest of Winter’s movie makes a good case for that status.

Winter takes a conventionally chronological approach, starting with Zappa’s not-musical childhood in southern California, his discovery as a teen of both R&B and the experimental, cacophonous music of the composer Edgard Varesé. The mix of the two started a lifelong pattern, of being presented with the choice between the commercially viable and the artistically interesting — and always choosing the latter.

This pattern becomes established through his formation of the Mothers of Invention, his move to forming his own independent label (after dropping four complete albums on Warner Bros.’ doorstep to complete his contractual obligation), and his moves away from rock performances to composing orchestral works that are too fiendishly complicated for most orchestras to tackle. (In the end, the movie shows Zappa hiring the London Symphony, just so he can hear the music he’s written.)

Because of his independence, Zappa was one of the few musicians to speak up in defense of the First Amendment when the Parents Music Resource Center — led by Susan Baker, wife of longtime Republican power broker James Baker, and Tipper Gore, wife of then-Sen. Al Gore — ginned up controversy about offensive rock lyrics.

Zappa is depicted as an uncompromising musician, but also a little aloof to his wife, Gail, and their four children. There’s a nice irony that the one time Zappa tried to involve his daughter, Moon, in the music-making process, it led to Zappa’s only Top 40 hit, the culture-defining 1982 song “Valley Girl.” (None of Zappa’s four children, who reportedly have feuded over control of their father’s estate and copyrights, are interviewed in this film.)

An interview with Gail (who died in 2015) and some archival interviews with Frank are the movie’s only windows into his personal side — and those views are fleeting and difficult to read. What Winter brings is a solid appreciation of Zappa’s music, particularly his lesser-known orchestral creations, and the singular passion that went into making it.

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‘Zappa’

★★★

Available starting Friday, November 27, on streaming via the Salt Lake Film Society virtual cinema, SLFS@Home. Not rated, but probably R for language. Running time: 129 minutes.