Never a savoury prospect to the outsider, concert movies grow like mould on the DVD racks, largely loveless, money-motivated campaign-fillers and album flyers.
It is a rare beast indeed that manages to appeal to anyone beyond the band's immediate fans, and this, The Cure's second bash at the elusive Decent Gig Film, faces the same problem. Unlike their undynamic 1986 effort, The Cure In Orange (directed on autopilot by Tim Pope), however, this has an intimacy and attention to detail that imbues what might ostensibly be a workaday two-hour live set with a great deal of life.
Despite a cavernous 30,000-seater arena, (the Palace, Detroit) and basketball court-sized stage, 16 cameras move candidly around the five band members (it was shot over two nights), allowing access to the grimacing, shrugging and sweating that is notoriously difficult to see from Seat 122, Block C, Row H. Robert Smith, inevitably, hogs the limelight, the effort and pain of his performance particularly revealing, while lithe bassist Simon Gallup and balding guitarist Porl Thompson provide rock 'n' roll fret-histrionics aplenty.
The film's success lies in the measured drama of the track list (slower stuff gives way to the jolly hits) and the unforgiving nature of the camerawork. It's a dramatic portrait of the jobbing stadium rock band that manages to paint its picture without resorting to dull dressing room banter.
With just an establishing montage of punters in slow motion to lead you in, it's heads down for a set based around 1991's Wish album that they peddled across the globe for nine months solid. If The Cure are not your bag, this certainly won't convert you, but it may turn the heads of those who see the band as a lazy, morose bedsit goth joke.