Dig!

The Brian Jonestown Massacre

• Anton Newcombe
• Jeffrey Davies
• Joel Gion
• Matt Hollywood
• Peter Hayes
• Dean Taylor

The Dandy Warhols

• Courtney Taylor-Taylor
• Peter Holmström
• Zia McCabe
• Brent DeBoer
• Eric Hedford

Additional cast

• David LaChapelle
• Genesis P-Orridge – commentator
• Adam Shore – commentator
• Miranda Lee Richards – musician

Taylor-Taylor, Newcombe and Warhols guitarist Peter Holmstrom have all criticized the film as being unfair in its portrayal of Newcombe and The Brian Jonestown Massacre.[2][3][4] On The Brian Jonestown Massacre's official website the film was denounced as reducing several years of hard work to "at best a series of punch-ups and mishaps taken out of context, and at worst bold faced lies and misrepresentation of fact."[5] Courtney Taylor-Taylor said in an interview: "It's a movie, not a documentary [...] She worked her ass off and forged a plot when there was no plot. She crafted the thing to swell and ebb by taking eight years of us and a year and a half of the Brian Jonestown Massacre".[6] Holmstrom was generally displeased with the film initially, citing Timoner's use of footage that he claims "was not to be used" as a reason, but has maintained that "it's still a good film", though one "I would have done differently".[4] Dandy Warhols drummer Brent DeBoer noted the film could have easily been a "feel-good story", but instead a few rare moments were specifically chosen to give the film a "Jerry Springer"-type storyline.[3]

The film was generally very well received critically. It currently has an approval rating of 90% on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 70 reviews, with an average rating of 7.8/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "So you wanna be a rock 'n' roll star? Dig! compellingly chronicles the ups and downs of the Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre, two ambitious bands whose love/hate relationship embodies many of the potential pratfalls of the music business."[7] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 76 out of 100, based on 28 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[8]

BBC Movies called it "Erratic, tragic, and absolutely hilarious: Dig! is fantastic filmmaking" that "works as both a savagely funny rockumentary and a sardonic comment on the politics of selling out."[9] An Empire review described its subject as the "microcosm of ‘indie’ music on the cusp of corporate take-over" and the film as "the perfect parable of the 1990s music industry" portraying a "riveting... mêlée of spiraling egos," also giving it a five-star rating.[10]

Allmovie, while giving the film a generally positive review, criticized the film's emphasis, writing "DIG! isn't as concerned with differences in the groups' musical styles (few songs are heard for more than a few bars at a time) as it is with personalities and interpersonal conflict. In this regard, it echoes the purportedly superficial concerns of the fickle industry it depicts, and it's not entirely clear whether this is Timoner's intent [...] In the end, the music should matter more than it apparently does."[11]

PopMatters gave the film a mixed review, commenting that "The film is less effective at conveying the genius of Anton Newcombe than the madness, possibly because the latter only requires a camera and Anton himself" but ultimately called it "fascinating" as a "behind-the-music-scenes glimpse".[12]

• Dig! at IMDb