When Wilko was diagnosed with (seemingly) terminal pancreatic cancer at the start of 2013, his unexpectedly euphoric reaction made his final months documentary gold.
The undoubted star of Temple’s Oil City Feelgood history, Mr Johnson is animated by the director’s allusive style, cinematic sampling and psychedelic inclinations.
Ecstasy charts a spectacular odyssey – a vital and erudite rock’n’roll life force symbolically plays chess with death on the shore of his beloved Canvey. Sundry revelations (a gleeful, Telecaster-toting Wilko recalling his abusive father’s death afront a local arcade is particularly potent), astute contributions from Roger Daltrey and Charlie Chan (the photographer/doctor who suggests a second opinion) fill out the picture.
To the previously screened-on-TV version, the handsomely packaged DVD adds a “watch with Wilko feature” and an excellent new essay by his biographer, Zoe Howe.
Wilko is a reluctant, humble, human and a warmly philosophical hero. He insists on maintaining a, wait for it, “sense of tumour”, but Temple adds footage of head-cleaving Viking berserkers to complement the incendiary presence captured on contemporary and archive clips. All told, the sort of life-affirming, death-defying Ecstasy everyone can share in.
