We Will Rock You (video) - Commentaries

Commentaries

Director Saul Swimmer recorded a commentary for the original laserdisc release of the concert. In it, he describes the process by which he and the band went about organizing and recording the concerts which eventually became this video. He is complimentary of the band and spoke positively about the experience. Specifically, he talked about the lengths he went to in order to convince the band to make the video at the end of their then-current tour. Swimmer said the deciding moment came when he took Freddie Mercury to the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. and showed him the three-storey IMAX screen, and told him to imagine himself five stories tall. Having convinced Freddie, the rest of the band followed suit.

When Queen eventually acquired the rights to the video, Brian May and Roger Taylor recorded a new commentary track, on which they discuss their feelings about the original process of making the concert video. May describes Swimmer's behaviour in trying to get the band to agree to the project in very negative terms. He says the director effectively hounded them and that when they relented, he was not easy to work with during the actual two nights of recording. Unlike Swimmer's earlier commentary track, which paints a generous picture of the relationship between himself and the band, May and Taylor's commentary track indicates very directly that this was not the case.

Read more about this topic:  We Will Rock You (video)