The legacy of Jeff Buckley has always felt like an unfinished symphony—a brilliant, soaring crescendo that was abruptly cut short before its final movement. Almost three decades after his tragic drowning in the Wolf River at just 30 years old, director Amy Berg delivers a definitive, deeply emotional, and painstakingly assembled retrospective with It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley.
Released by Magnolia Pictures, this highly anticipated documentary doesn’t just rehash the devastating timeline of a life lost too soon. Instead, it resurrects the magnetic, mercurial spirit of the man behind the music, cutting through the mythos to find the profoundly human artist at the centre.
The Sin-é Days and Archival Gold
What immediately sets It’s Never Over apart from standard, run-of-the-mill VH1-style music biographies is its breathtaking level of intimacy. With Buckley’s mother, Mary Guibert, granting unprecedented access to the family archives (and Brad Pitt stepping in as executive producer to help champion the project) Berg weaves together an absolute goldmine of previously unseen material.
The film brilliantly grounds us in Buckley’s early grind. We see rare, electrifying footage of his legendary solo gigs at the East Village cafe Sin-é, where a young Buckley captivated tiny rooms with nothing but a Fender Telecaster and a voice that seemed to defy human anatomy. By utilising personal answering machine messages, scribbled diary entries, and raw, behind-the-scenes video clips, Berg crafts a narrative that effectively makes it feel as though Buckley himself is narrating his own story from beyond the grave.
The Weight of a Name
The documentary doesn’t shy away from the immense psychological pressure Buckley faced, even before the critical explosion of his landmark 1994 album, Grace. Berg captures the suffocating weight of industry expectations and the inescapable, haunting shadow of his absentee father, 60s folk icon Tim Buckley. The film poignantly explores how Jeff desperately tried to carve out his own identity while constantly being compared to a father he barely knew.
The interviews gathered here are stellar and refreshingly candid. We get raw and honest insights from his inner circle, including ex-girlfriends like Rebecca Moore and Joan Wasser, alongside industry heavyweights like Ben Harper, Jimmy Page, and the late Chris Cornell. These talking heads don’t just heap blind, posthumous praise; they paint a beautifully complex portrait of an artist who was as emotionally fragile as he was musically brilliant. They describe a man struggling to find his footing while his idols heaped generational expectations onto his shoulders.
The Difficult Second Album
One of the most fascinating segments of the film delves into the fraught recording sessions for what would have been his second album, Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk. Through studio outtakes and exasperated recollections from producers and bandmates, the documentary captures a perfectionist unravelling under the pressure to follow up a masterpiece. It’s a heartbreaking look at the creative paralysis that often accompanies sudden, overwhelming acclaim.
An Unfinished Masterpiece
If there’s any flaw to be found in It’s Never Over, it’s that the film can occasionally feel slightly constrained by its “authorised” nature. Because it relies heavily on the cooperation of his estate, the documentary carefully tiptoes around some of the darker, grittier edges of the 90s music machine and the more chaotic elements of his final months in Memphis.
However, as a celebration of pure, unadulterated talent, it is absolutely essential viewing. The inclusion of his spine-tingling live performances, especially the cinematic treatment of his iconic, definitive cover of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” will be sure to leave you with goosebumps. The film’s handling of his final days is tasteful and devastating, leaving us with an inevitable sense of heartbreak for the decades of music we were robbed of.
The Verdict
It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley is a masterfully crafted, tear-jerking documentary that honours the ethereal voice of a generation without completely losing itself in the myth. Amy Berg has delivered a sympathetic, urgent, and visually stunning look at a monumental talent. It ensures that while Buckley may be gone, but his cultural impact is truly never over.
It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley releases in cinemas April 30.
