Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road (2021) on Netflix
NR20211h 33mDocumentary
Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys' co-founder, drives around Los Angeles with Rolling Stone editor Jason Fine, revisiting places from his past. Other musicians discuss his influence.
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- Netflix4.1/5
- IMDb7.3/101,387 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes92%
Trailer
Plot summary
Jason Fine, a Rolling Stone editor who has interviewed Brian Wilson for years, drives around Los Angeles with him, stopping at places connected to his life and work. The talk from those trips carries much of the film, which is about Wilson, co-founder of the Beach Boys, and his career. Around the drives the film places studio and archival footage, home movies lent by the Wilson family, and remarks from other musicians about his influence. The soundtrack collects unreleased Wilson recordings, including material from 1990s sessions with producer Andy Paley, and a new song, "Right Where I Belong," made with Jim James.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road (2021)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The documentary was first shot as a conventional structured interview, but Brian Wilson could not open up in that format and the sessions produced no usable footage at all. Rolling Stone editor Jason Fine, who had been interviewing and writing about Wilson since the 1990s, was brought in to ask the questions instead.
- The format that replaced it came from a 2015 Jason Fine article built out of conversations the two men had while driving around Los Angeles together. The film copied that set-up, and more than 70 hours of footage were shot across just three weekends.
- The film's one new song, "Right Where I Belong", started as rough melodic ideas from Brian Wilson; My Morning Jacket's Jim James then structured it, wrote the lyrics and recorded most of the track by himself. Wilson added his vocal parts after recovering from back surgery.
- The tie-in album of never-before-released material, announced in 2021 and issued by Lakeshore Records that November, turned out to be the last record Brian Wilson put out in his lifetime; he died on 11 June 2025.
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