Let’s Get Lost *** (1988, director Bruce Weber) – Classic Movie Review 11,661

In 1987 fashion photographer Bruce Weber was still working on his first feature film Broken Noses (1987) when met the legendary jazz trumpeter and vocalist Chet Baker and began filming him, intending to create a short film based on their portrait sitting. But filming with Chet Baker continued right through the presentation of Broken Noses in Cannes in 1987. And then Weber assembled the footage of travel, recording sessions and interviews into his second feature, Let’s Get Lost (1988).

The film debuted in Venice, where it won the Cinecritica award, and it was nominated for a Grand Jury Award at Sundance, and for an Oscar for Best Documentary Feature.

Weber’s film traces Chet Baker’s career from the 1950s, playing with jazz greats like Charlie Parker, Gerry Mulligan and Russ Freeman, to the 1980s, when his heroin addiction and domestic troubles kept him in Europe. Weber contrasts the two eras and highlights the poignant difference between the young handsome Baker and the wrecked looking old guy, while former associates, ex-wives and children, talk about him.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,661

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