Wesley Willis’s Joyrides

D: Chris Bagley & Kim Shively

Wesley Willis was an imposing figure onscreen and off. The 6-foot-6-inch 300-plus-pound Chicago native enjoyed a relatively successful – financially and otherwise – cult career, producing beautifully and meticulously drawn outsider art and startling Casio-driven songs about bestiality and “Rock N Roll McDonalds,” among other offbeat topics. Willis suffered from schizophrenia and a difficult family life, which filmmakers Bagley and Shively brilliantly and respectfully document in their loving doc, Wesley Willis’s Joyrides. His demons antagonized his mind with insulting and profane “hellrides” at times; at others, he playfully head-butted anybody and everybody who shared space with this mammoth artist – which his tumorlike bruise on his forehead attested to. Eventually he added another adversary to his list: leukemia. Bagley and Shively handle this painful turn of events with equal regard and leave viewers with a touching and reverent homage to this troubled head-butter extraordinaire.

Saturday, March 15, 11am, Dobie

This article appears in March 14 • 2008.

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