‘Billy Joel: And So It Goes’: Part One Movie Review

Within the first ten minutes of Billy Joel: And So It Goes, which made its global debut on Wednesday at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City, present day Billy Joel says something self-deprecating.

“The most original thing I’ve ever done in my life is screw up,” he says from his Long Island home. “That’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

And So It Goes is meant to cover Joel’s entire career — though only part one of it was shown at Tribeca — including the things Joel might describe as a “screw up.” It is, after all, close to impossible to be a successful rock star without burning some bridges and hurting some people you love. Workplace hazards.

It’s fitting that this film made its debut in New York City, the place where not only Joel was born but in which he truly came into his own. He tried the California scene for a while, but as one of the film’s talking heads says, a fellow called Bruce Springsteen, Joel was a bridge-and-tunnel guy with a penchant for combining elements of Broadway, Tin Pan Alley and American Songbook influences into one, melody-focused sound that feels intrinsically New York.

“I’ve never been comfortable on camera,” Joel also says at the beginning of the film. “I can’t hide behind the piano.” To be fair, it is a lot different to be in front of a camera crew than in front of tens of thousands of fans.

What you will learn though in part one of And So It Goes, is that Joel has always been a hard worker, an obsessive when it comes to music and someone fiercely loyal to those close to him. He signed with Columbia Records because he knew they represented Bob Dylan, a man with no chart success but who was given the space and money to be himself in the studio. At another point, Joel was offered an opportunity to work with producer George Martin of Beatles fame. Joel turned it down when he learned Martin was not interested in using Joel’s band. “Love me,” he recounts saying at the time, “love my band.”

Other talking heads help to fill out the picture that is not just Billy Joel the Entertainer, but Billy Joel the boy from Hicksville: his sister Judy, his teenage best friend Jon Small (whose wife Joel swept away from him but who also later saved Joel’s life from a second suicide attempt), plus famous faces like John Mellencamp, Paul McCartney (who admits he wishes he wrote Joel’s “Just the Way You Are”), Pink, Garth Brooks, Clive Davis, Jackson Browne and others.

READ MORE: The Best Song From Every Billy Joel Album

There’s also Joel’s first wife, Elizabeth Weber, the aforementioned one who was previously married to Joel’s best friend and eventually became Joel’s full-time manager. Weber, the film emphatically tells us, was his muse, bulldog, support system and fiercest champion such that it is unclear where Joel might have ended up without her.

The film’s greatest weakness is that it comes across extremely structured — first this, then that, then this — using time that could be better spent understanding how Joel channels his emotions into his creativity at the piano. As a viewer who has always considered herself a casual fan, there was much to learn about Joel’s background, upbringing and family, but nothing that could not have been read on Wikipedia. One is left more curious about how a seemingly normal, shy kid from Long Island was able to craft melodies and make recordings that have stood the test of time.

Part one ends around the time Joel and Weber split up and of 1980’s Glass Houses album. “America’s rock poet,” as one advertisement shown in the film describes him, was in the middle of a golden age.

For those seeking a more comprehensive understanding about Joel’s creative well and the process he used to become one of the best-selling recording artists in the world, And So It Goes will not open that door. But for a walk through the life of someone who strayed true to his passion even when no one believed in him — or perhaps more compelling, when everyone believed in him except for him — this documentary will do the trick.

Joel recently revealed a diagnosis of normal pressure hydrocephalus, a brain disorder that affects cognitive abilities, balance, vision and hearing. It is often mistaken for Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease. Joel has canceled all concert dates as a result, making this film all the more timely.

Joel’s song “Summer, Highland Falls” from 1976’s Turnstiles is played during the portion of the film dedicated to Joel’s return to New York from California in the mid ’70s. The opening lines more aptly convey the feeling of And So It Goes and, by extension, Joel’s up-and-down career and personal life: “They say that these are not the best of times / But they’re the only times I’ve ever known.”

Billy Joel: And So It Goes, will head to HBO for streaming this summer.