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The Greatest Night in Pop

2024

Bao Nguyen

Documentary, Self: Lionel Richie, Quincy Jones, Bruce Springsteen ...

7.3

1,300

Documentary On January 25th, 1985, dozens of the era's most popular musicians gathered in Los Angeles to record a charity single for African famine relief. Setting egos aside, they collaborated on a song that would make history.

	Media	Author	Review
		Rodrigo Perez The Playlist	"It’s a supremely engagingly crafted doc, crowd-pleasing to the hilt, and a terrific behind-the-scenes look at a once-in-a-lifetime moment in music history."
		Richard Roeper Chicago Sun-Times	"Fascinating Netflix doc revisits the 1985 night when most of music’s biggest stars heeded a certain call and blended their famous voices into a blockbuster charity single (...) Rating: ★★★ (out of 4)"
		Glenn Kenny The New York Times	"While the making of the song was partially detailed in its long-form video, there's plenty of new, engaging, and sometimes eyebrow-raising anecdotal material here"
		Owen Gleiberman Variety	"A look at the making of 'We Are the World' that’s as starstruck and irresistible as the song itself"
		David Ehrlich IndieWire	"While [it] may not amount to anything more than a sanitized and somewhat masturbatory look back at one of the wildest get-togethers in the modern history of music, there’s no denying that it’s a lot of fun to watch it all go down."
		Brian Lowry CNN	"This trip down memory lane fulfills its promise to make a better day for you and me"
		Nick Schager The Daily Beast	"As far as celebratory backward glances go, it's compelling enough to temporarily brighten one's day"
		David Rooney The Hollywood Reporter	"The message of collective compassion, of helping those less fortunate, is quite moving"
		Ben Pearson SlashFilm	"'The Greatest Night in Pop' certainly lives up to its name by delivering a jaw-dropping and occasionally even transcendent peek behind the curtain of one of music's biggest moments"
		Brian Tallerico rogerebert.com	"The main appreciation that anyone watching 'The Greatest Night in Pop' will have is that Quincy Jones is a master (..:) Watching him work is fascinating, an example of a true musical genius (...) Rating: ★★★ (out of 4)"
		Kristy Puchko Mashable	"A documentary that is undeniably enchanting — even if willfully naive."
		Ross Bonaime Collider	"There's nothing necessarily wrong with how Nguyen presents this story, but there's also nothing that really jumps out about it either"
		Johnny Loftus Decider	"'The Greatest Night in Pop' is at its best when it just lets the tape roll on how 'We Are the World' played out"
		Chris Bumbray JoBlo	"A moving account of a one-off recording that would be all but impossible to recreate"

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