Eh, I don’t think the reason The Song Remains The Same isn’t remembered fondly has anything to do with Led Zeppelin not being relevant anymore; I think they are. It’s just a bad film: a poorly filmed, less-than-medicore performance from a normally stellar-live band, with cheesy, silly interstituals.
That’s what I meant. The movie sucked, not the band. I was always a Zeppelin fan too. But my other point was today how completely British Hard Rock is an extinct species, vanished from the earth.
How can I possibly be the first person to name “A Hard Day’s Night”? As Roger Ebert puts it:
Great movie, and a great back-story to it as well. Not-bad acting (of course they were playing themselves), decent story, and of course terrific music.
Montery Pop…better than Woodstock IMHO. It was the only one of my faves not mentioned (unless you want to add in “The Commitments” which is not a “rock movie” but a movie with some kick a** rock/rhythm and blues).
mc
Ah. 
I count myself lucky for having actually been to one of the concerts on the Stop Making Sense tour — at Red Rocks Amphitheater, 1983 — and it definitely was the concert of a lifetime. The movie was a chance to relive a terrific experience, therefore doubly welcome.
AC/DC: Let There Be Rock.
Quadrophenia (The Who) and True Stories (Talking Heads).
Frank Zappa’s 200 Motels or Baby Snakes (Which is a slight parody of The Song Remains the Same)
The Wall is a god movie, but I not as good as Pink Floyd at Pompei
I have seen a rough cut of the Led Zeppelin live DVD coming out later this year.
If you are a Zep fan you will be in 7th heaven. If you are not a Zep fan you will be by the end of the DVD.
It has performances from 68-79, all of which are incendiary.
Forget TSRTS, even Zep have, they didn’t remaster it.
No one’s going to say anything about Rock and Roll High School with the Ramones but it was better than all the above movies, save Gimme Shelter and possibly Don’t Look Back. Towards the end they’ve got The Ramones, circa '79, playing like 6 or 7 songs live. Just don’t get better than that, friends.
But even better than R&RHS, perhaps the most underrated movie ever: Roadie.
You’ve GOT to check out The T.A.M.I. Show! How does Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, the Supremes, the Beach Boys, James Brown, Chuck Berry and the Rolling Stones sound for a line up? And others (Jan and Dean, Leslie Gore, Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, etc). But at the end, when Mick Jagger and Diana Ross bump and grind with each other to (I think) “I Used to Love Her,” it’s priceless!
:smack: The song is called “It’s All Over Now,” not “I Used to Love Her.”
1991: The Year Punk Broke is a must for fans of Nirvana and Sonic Youth. “I’m so hungry I could eat a pig’s head. Does anybody have a pigs head?” - Thurston Moore
Crusoe, True Stories was a cool, fun movie, but it wasn’t a Talking Heads movie (it wasn’t even really a rock movie, for that matter). It was a David Byrne thing, and Byrne certainly brought the same artistic whackyness to writing and directing it that he infused in Talking Heads music all right… but… mutated gospel songs like “Puzzling Evidence,” voodoo songs like “Papa Legba”, and country songs like “People Like Us” take it well outside the boundaries of rock-‘n’-roll.
Preacher: Texas is still paying for the assassination of President Kennedy!
Lying Woman: I had an affair with him!
‘The Filth and the Fury’ is a great examination of the Sex Pistols saga. Oh, and 'That’ll Be The Day"/‘Stardust’: a pair of films portraying the rise and fall of a rock star-with Ringo, Moonie, and Dave Edmunds, among others.
Yessongs comes to mind. It’s the 1973 Close To The Edge tour film by Richard Ellman.
Not only was it a great moment in the band’s history, BUT it features animation by Roger Dean, the artist whose style defined the pre-90125 YES look.
Cartooniverse
To respond as an aside, I’m not sure it’s fair to lump Gimme Shelter and Woodstock in with pure performance films. In those ( and many other )cases, the film is more about a social event that included many fine and lovely musical perfomances.
I understand the O.P., and don’t mean to nitpick too much here. It just seems to me that a good solid rock film is one thing, a larger canvassed documentary is another.
My two cents.
What definition are we using? If Quadrophenia is acceptable, why not True Stories?
The main thing I meant to ask was if there were films that were not only good as films (production values, cinematography, sound), but also showcased a group so expertly that it would force a viewer to take a second look at the band.