'The Devil and Daniel Johnston' offers an insiders' look at the artist

If David Bowie was the man who fell to Earth, Daniel Johnston was the man who fell to Austin.

He arrived here from West Virginia in the mid-'80s armed with weird drawings of bug-eyed monsters and scratchy, low-fidelity tapes of his music. Some considered him an unlistenable joke; some hipsters found his songs utterly beguiling, haunting missives from a singular talent.

Sony Pictures Classics 'The Devil and Daniel Johnston' 4 out of 5 stars The verdict: Johnston's own archives give documentary its power. Director: Jeff Feuerzeig Cast: Daniel Johnston, Mabel Johnston, Bill Johnston, Kathy McCarty, Jeff Tartakov Run time: 110 minutes Release date: March 31, 2006 Rating: PG-13 for thematic elements, drug content, and language including a sexual reference. On the web Official movie site View the trailer    Trailers require Quicktime Rate 'The Devil and Daniel Johnston'   Go see it   Make it a matinee   Wait to rent   Don't bother Voter Limit: Once per Hour View Poll Results

Johnston also had an obsessive personality and a brutal bipolar disorder than made him prone to near-psychotic breaks. It's been a rough road ever since, with Johnston experiencing time in the Austin State Hospital, cult-level deification, a brief flirtation with major labels and, last year, a near-death experience from possible lithium poisoning.

The miracle, then, of director Jeff Feuerzeig's wonderfully realized "The Devil and Daniel Johnston" is Feuerzeig's ability to avoid fetishizing Johnston's illness as it related to his art, while still keeping the illness as his surreal narrative's fulcrum. Johnston never conquers his devils — he lives with them, much to the exhaustion of his family, friends and on-and-off manager and tape label honcho Jeff Tartakov, whom Johnston once assaulted. Shot on Super 16, "Devil" is the rare music doc that springs from fandom but feels universal in scope.

Born in West Virginia to artistic but deeply religious parents, Johnston's arty side was indulged almost from the jump. He drew pictures of comic book characters and monsters, shot home movies and made music constantly.

But as the years wore on, his eccentricities became harder to control. In college, he became obsessed with a woman named Laurie Allen, who has haunted him, muse-like, ever since. Then there was that stint as a carney and the 1985 MTV special on Austin that exposed Johnston to the hipster nation. It's been a roller coaster ever since.

Feuerzeig assembles talking heads from all over Johnston's life and career. Butthole Surfers front-lunatic Gibby Haynes is interviewed as his teeth are being drilled — it was at an '86 Surfers concert that an acid trip turned into a more permanent mental problem for Johnston. Friends such as Kathy McCarty — who dated Johnston, covered his songs as a tribute album and fell in love with and married his best pal — and Tartakov skillfully outline, defend and unpack Johnston's genius.

That said, it's mighty tough (though never exploitative) to hear Johnston's parents, especially his father, Bill, speak of their son's troubles. The story of Johnston nearly killing himself and his dad when he grabbed control of their small plane in midair is utterly heartbreaking.

But the truly amazing part of the film comes from Johnston himself, as self-documentation might be the most powerful of his daily obsessions. As a result, Feuerzeig gained access to one of the most remarkable artistic archives any documentary filmmaker has had the luck to stumble across, and these clips add invaluable context, color and depth. Not only do we see furtive, ghostlike film of Allen in college, we get audio of fights with Johnston's long-suffering parents, his arrest at the Statue of Liberty and arguments with members of Sonic Youth after Johnston went missing while under their supervision.

Throughout this wonderful film, we see the giddiness and weariness of the compulsive artist and those around him, the truth and consequences of what happens when a desire to be creative bumps up against a brain that won't let you without exacting a hideous toll.