{"id":227,"date":"2006-03-24T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-03-24T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/killer-gets-life.html"},"modified":"2006-03-24T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2006-03-24T12:00:00","slug":"killer-gets-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/killer-gets-life.html","title":{"rendered":"“Killer” Gets Life"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

Easily the best media moment for the Mormon Church in the past year is \u201cNew York Doll<\/a>,\u201d a documentary about the last days of rock bassist Arthur \u201cKiller\u201d Kane. The movie, released theatrically last fall and on DVD April 6th<\/a>, shows that it\u2019s possible to be a Latter-day Saint while maintaining legendary cult status, reuniting with your old band, and finding redemption.<\/p>\n

Kane was a founding member of the New York Dolls<\/a>, a group that was for the punk\/New Wave revolution what, say, Buddy Holly was to rock \u2018n roll\u2019s first generation: a bolt-from-the-blue talent that changed everything, then vanished. The film finds Kane living in Los Angeles in 2004, 30 years after the band dissolved, thanks to drug-related deaths, heroine and Kane\u2019s own alcoholism. After hitting bottom\u2014he jumped out a window after seeing former bandmate David Johanson in the movie \u201cScrooged\u201d\u2014Kane discovered Mormonism, which he credits with saving his life. We meet Killer\u2019s co-workers at the Family History Center at L.A.\u2019s LDS Temple<\/a>, as well as his former and current bishops and other assorted Mormons\u2014all apparently reasonable, faithful people who accept Kane\u2019s history and support him when the call comes from London for a reunion with the two other remaining living Dolls.<\/p>\n

Greg Whitely, the director of \u201cNew York Doll\u201d met Kane at church, and the film appealingly recreates his slow-dawning realization<\/a> that Kane, a gawky, seemingly na\u00efve specimen, is the object of awe and respect among some of rock\u2019s top names. What makes \u201cNew York Doll\u201d a serious spiritual film is Kane\u2019s (and his co-religionists\u2019) appreciation for the Dolls\u2019 reunion as a sacred moment. The concert’s critical and musical success<\/a> pales for Kane next to the chance to restore his relationship with Johanson, whom he\u2019d turned into a symbol of his own failure and lost glamour, and whose attention and love he still seeks out as a supplicant.<\/p>\n

Kane\u2019s renewal doesn\u2019t return him to a pure state, but gives him his life back with his scars intact. We see that he sees it, and through the rasping, impish Johanson\u2019s goading about his conversion, Kane exhibits a dignity that his old pal\u2019s stardom can\u2019t tarnish. Kane unexpectedly died<\/a> less than a month after returning from London, from leukemia, and this film is the perfect epitaph to a life badly lived, but fully realized.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Easily the best media moment for the Mormon Church in the past year is \u201cNew York Doll,\u201d a documentary about the last days of rock bassist Arthur \u201cKiller\u201d Kane. The movie, released theatrically last fall and on DVD April 6th, shows that it\u2019s possible to be a Latter-day Saint while maintaining legendary cult status, reuniting…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":275,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\n"Killer" Gets Life<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2006\/03\/killer-gets-life.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\""Killer" Gets Life\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Easily the best media moment for the Mormon Church in the past year is \u201cNew York Doll,\u201d a documentary about the last days of rock bassist Arthur \u201cKiller\u201d Kane. 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