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Mystify: Michael Hutchence

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Mystify: Michael Hutchence

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Mystify: Michael Hutchence

Mystify: Michael Hutchence is a 2019 documentary film about the life of musician, actor and singer-songwriter Michael Hutchence, lead vocalist of the Australian rock band INXS. It is written and directed by Richard Lowenstein and relies primarily on rare archive footage, outtakes, private home video and audio commentary provided by friends, ex-partners, band members, record producers and family. An Australian-British venture, the film was co-produced by Ghost Pictures, Passion Pictures with Madman Entertainment and Dogwoof serving as distributors. It is in association with Baird Films and Film Victoria. Mystify: Michael Hutchence had its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival on 25 April 2019, and was theatrically released in Australia on 4 July 2019. The film was released in the United Kingdom on 18 October receiving generally positive reviews from critics.

Mystify covers the life of INXS lead singer Michael Hutchence, featuring private home video and archive footage. During the relationship between Minogue and Hutchence, previously unseen privately shot footage shows them in Hong Kong harbour, on board the Orient Express, and at Hutchence’s home in the south of France. In the early 1990s an incident occurred while cycling on holiday in Copenhagen with then girlfriend Helena Christensen, where Hutchence gets shoved to the ground by a taxi driver, hitting his head on the curb and losing consciousness. According to Christensen, Hutchence was rushed to hospital and woke up determined to leave. The injury resulted in Hutchence having permanent loss of sense of smell and taste as discussed by psychologist and cognitive neuroscientist, Rachel Herz. Clips show Yates and Hutchence in a 1985 interview on Channel 4's rock magazine programme The Tube and many years later on The Big Breakfast interview in October 1994. Recollections with voice-overs in the film include Michele Bennett, Kylie Minogue, siblings Rhett and Tina Hutchence, father Kelland Hutchence, stepmother Susie, producer Nick Launay, Bono and INXS band members; composer and keyboardist Andrew Farriss, guitarist Tim Farriss, bassist Garry Gary Beers and drummer Jon Farriss. The film ends with INXS performing at London’s Wembley Stadium and the song "Mystify" plays over the credits.

Plans for a biographical drama film about Michael Hutchence were being developed with a script written by Australian film-maker Richard Lowenstein. Lowenstein had previously collaborated with Hutchence in Dogs in Space and INXS music videos. The film was to feature an actor as Hutchence, however the idea of casting someone proved very difficult and with the announcement of the miniseries INXS: Never Tear Us Apart, it made the director switch to an archival documentary. The documentary film gathered early development funding and support by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), Screen Australia and Film Victoria.

A pitch trailer was produced and shown at the 2016 Australian International Documentary Conference in Melbourne where BBC Music took interest. In July 2016, it was announced that a documentary film about the singer-songwriter Michael Hutchence had the official support of INXS band members and manager Chris Murphy, with Richard Lowenstein signed on to direct.

The director conducted the first interview (for the biopic research) in 2010 with U2 lead singer Bono who were on tour in Melbourne. Band members from INXS were then interviewed and filmed in 2011, gradually building up an archive of footage. During the interview process, Lowenstein had decided to record just the audio, having individual interviewees in a dark recording studio. A total of around sixty people were interviewed.

Tapes of archival footage of varying quality were found in the directors attic lost for twenty years. In October 2017, long negotiations began for the rights to use INXS music in the film, but ended with no deal due to a dispute with Murphy of Petrol Records over the documentary’s ownership in return. This lead the director to produce an edit of the film with no music from the INXS catalogue. Eventually, Lowenstein made contact with Hutchence’s daughter Tiger Hutchence-Geldof (the daughter of Hutchence and Paula Yates) in London, through Susie Hutchence’s advice. Lowenstein flew to London in October 2018 to meet. After viewing a rough cut of the film, Tiger Lily made contact with the band’s management and record company. A day later, a deal was struck to use nine INXS tracks.

The post-production and supervision of the film were completed by United Finishing Artists with the sound mixing done at Soundfirm, Melbourne.

Composer Warren Ellis was in charge of the film's music and score. The documentary features various digitally-restored tracks which were remixed by Giles Martin in Dolby Atmos supplied by INXS. Music also included are by Hutchence, Max Q with Ollie Olsen, Kylie Minogue, Nick Cave, instrumentals by Ólafur Arnalds and Nils Frahm.

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