Even in a world where every mundane humiliation is fodder for reality entertainment and where no story is too pathetic or perverse to be retold to serve our fetish for docu-dramas, it boggles the mind to consider exactly what director Greg B. Whiteley was thinking when he decided to make a feature film on the life of Arthur "Killer" Kane. The fact that he has told a most compelling story of such a forgotten figure is reason enough to see the movie, New York Doll, and worthy testament to how Arthur -- the bass player in a band that was relegated to remainder bins within months of their short career, a bad drunk and oft-bitter slave to his delusions who was fool enough to trade in mid-'70s New York City for the cultural exile of Los Angeles, and, most inexplicable of all, a Mormon -- was such a lovely spirit of impeccable grace and irony.
Killer Kane changed our lives in more ways than most of us could count or properly thank him for. Perhaps the acceleration of consumer appetites has made the seminal band of which he was a part, the New York Dolls, as relevant today as the original 8-track tape I still have of their eponymous 1973 debut. Without them, none of us might ever have cared so much for music. The Dolls were the epitome of the adage (usually reserved for the Velvets or the Stooges) that if only 20 people were at the show or only 100 bought the record, it was still possible to change the course of popular culture for millions.
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