“It’s better to burn out than to fade away” – Neil Young
“Glory days
Well, they’ll pass you by, glory days
In the wink of a young girl’s eye, glory days
Glory days” – Bruce Springsteen
Sometimes the local film festival brings you stories that you would think you would know about. This year’s example is GREEN BLAH! THE HISTORY OF GREEN BAY PUNK ROCK which sets out to chart the rise and fall of a surprisingly vital punk rock scene in Green Bay and vicinity from the 1970s until the 1990s from its birth is Bart Starr’s (!) basement to its demise with an incident at Kutska’s that basically destroyed the floor and left punk rock without a viable venue in the area. And beyond that.
GREEN BLAH! THE HISTORY OF GREEN BAY PUNK ROCK is clearly a labor of love by directors Christopher Pretti and James J. Baker. Reportedly, it’s been more than a decade in the making and seems to be the definitive document on Green Bay’s punk rock scenes. And, in that respect, it’s almost impossible to find fault with the film. It uncovers a wealth of archival material including rare recordings, promotional flyers, fanzines, and rare footage. The fact that they have footage of the infamous night at Kutska’s, in the era before everyone was carrying around smart phones, is a jewel that long established documentarians would kill for. There are a wealth of interviews too, it seems everyone that was part of the scene, no matter how minor, has a story to tell. And are passionate about telling it.
And it also delves into the why’s of the Green Bay scene, the reality of the 70s following the glories of the Vince Lombardi era Packers brought the city to a point where it’s imagined self didn’t match the reality. Especially for kids who were more into music than sports. It’s somewhat unremarked about, but even for rock musicians, the bands were remarkably young, it’s very rare to find someone that was out of high school playing in a band at the time.
Much of the film is bracing and fun. That said, you kind of have to excuse some clumsy edits and a lack of dynamic production values. This is a love affair of a movie, but it’s a love affair made by people that are clearly no polished craftspeople. Albeit, the fact that the subject of the documentary is punk music, makes any technical deficiencies very forgivable.
It’s harder though to forgive the unshaped nature of the narrative. At sometimes it seems like the films is telling the story through the bands and individuals, at other times it seems to center around the various venues. I wish they had chosen one or the other as a focus. The result is a lot of “and then this happened” followed by “and then this happened.” The talking heads interviews can also become something like older people reminiscing about the glory days at times, with some of the drawbacks of that. None of that is fatal to the movie, I think a lot of the formless nature of the film is due to the nature of trying to include everything perhaps due to the assumption that there would never be another crack at this material. (An assumption I think is likely correct.) This is likely the one and only chance to tell this story, and it’s understandable to include everything as a document instead of editing things out for a more formed narrative. That said, the unshaped nature does rear its head in stalling the narrative of the film at times.
But, GREEN BLAH! THE HISTORY OF GREEN BAY PUNK ROCK is a film told with passion above all else. It incorporates the spirit of the music scene it’s trying to document. And, as a result, it’s created something like a definitive document. That’s a victory.
The 2025 Milwaukee Film Festival runs from April 24, 2025 until May 8, 2025. GREEN BLAH! THE HISTORY OF GREEN BAY PUNK ROCK has already completed its run at the festival. However, tickets to other films can be purchased at MKEFILM.ORG.
