Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		4.0

Ozzy Osbourne: God Bless Ozzy Osbourne Blu-ray Movie Review

Getting straight.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 14, 2012

You might be driven to drink and take copious amounts of mind altering drugs if your best known achievements were biting the head off of a bat and speaking incoherently. Of course, many would argue that drinking and taking copious amounts of mind altering drugs are what led Ozzy Osbourne to those questionable accomplishments. Osbourne is one of the oddest cultural icons of the past half century or so, a man who was “just another” heavy metal superstar, albeit one credited with helping put the genre on the map, but it actually wasn’t until his much publicized bouts with various substance abuse and his quasi-reality series The Osbournes became an unexpected hit on MTV from 2002 until 2005 that Osbourne seemed to achieve something approaching “lovable” status. The fact that he was able to do so while stumbling around bumping into things and mumbling in an idiolect that can only charitably be called actual speech makes his rise to the top of the pop cultural heap all the more amazing. God Bless Ozzy Osbourne is a rather riveting look at the long and winding road Osbourne has traversed, both in his heavy metal superstar days and the long slog toward sobriety afterward. Filmmakers Mike Fleiss and Mike Piscitelli, along with Ozzy’s own son Jack, who produced, capture an unvarnished look at Ozzy, one which includes both his peccadilloes as well as his saving graces—and, yes, there are some saving graces on display here. The problem with a “character” like Ozzy Osbourne is that the man has passed into something close to self-parody, quite a bit of it due to his own out of control behavior, and it’s therefore more than a bit difficult to obtain a semi-rational, clear headed picture of the actual person beneath the persona. But with help from Jack, the filmmakers were granted pretty much an “all access” pass to Ozzy for over four years, and the resulting portrait is surprisingly full blooded (no bat pun intended) and well rounded. God Bless Ozzy Osbourne may not completely convince nonbelievers that there’s an actual honest to goodness human being lurking somewhere beneath the heavy metal hoopla, but fans will certainly be delighted and even surprised at some of the details that emerge in this fascinating documentary.

John Michael Osbourne was born into a rather poor family in wartorn England in 1948. As Ozzy and his sisters reminisce, they weren’t just “run of the mill” poor, they were the poorest family on their block, so poor that all six Osbourne children slept together in one bedroom. Ozzy had dreams of music stardom from a relatively early age and he had the good sense to ask his father for a PA system, something that instantly set him apart from the scores of other would be icons who were posting “want to join a band” ads at the local music store. The PA system was Ozzy’s entrée into what would eventually become Black Sabbath, something Ozzy himself seems to recognize both the humor of the situation as well as how fortuitous it was Ozzy convinced his Dad to buy him the equipment.

Black Sabbath’s meteoric rise is chronicled in some detail, but mostly from the standpoint of how completely unexpected it was and how detrimental that success was for the band members. Ozzy is on record here stating how completely unprepared he was for this kind of worldwide success and the easy access to both women and, more devastatingly for him personally, drugs that his overnight fame provided. A really interesting sidelight in this sequence are interviews with Ozzy’s two adult children from his first, lesser known marriage. Both kids aren’t especially gracious in their memories of a missing father who, when he did show up to interact with them, was frequently drunk out of his mind. “Was he a good father?” the narrator asks Ozzy’s daughter. She pauses for a moment, the answers definitively, “No.”

Ozzy’s life turned upside down first with Black Sabbath’s immediate overwhelming success and then perhaps even more when Sabbath fired him some years later. It’s fascinating to hear his bandmates say one of the reasons, in fact perhaps the main reason, that Ozzy was let go was that he couldn’t handle the drugs. Now, it isn’t an altruistic statement on their part—what they’re implying is that Ozzy’s inability to “maintain” was getting in the way of them partying. Sharon tells a disturbing story of Ozzy locked away in his bedroom, curled up on the floor in a fetal position, surrounded by bottles and drugs, and marinating in his own bodily fluids, as he reached the nadir of his self esteem, before he bounced back as a solo artist, including at first with the remarkable guitarist Randy Rhoads, who was tragically killed in an airplane crash a short while later.

Ozzy’s continued substance abuse gets him to the point mentioned earlier in this review of becoming almost a self-parody, and then something rather amazing happens. After the travails of the entire Osbourne family had been broadcast for all the world to see on The Osbournes and, by default, every gossip mongering “entertainment” magazine on the air, Jack decided he needed to get sober. According to Sharon, that more or less shamed Ozzy into doing the same himself, and after a lifetime of hedonism, Ozzy is going on five years without having had any drugs or alcohol. He’s in remarkably good shape (he’s lost a lot of weight and looks great), exercises regularly and is even learning how to drive. Most importantly, he seems to have achieved a modicum of inner peace after having confronted his own personal demons. The closing moments of this fascinating documentary find Ozzy on his knees praying in his dressing room before one of his concerts. It may catch some of his ardent head banging fans off guard, but it’s a touching moment that proves saving grace can come to even the most unlikely suspects.

Ozzy Osbourne: God Bless Ozzy Osbourne Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

God Bless Ozzy Osbourne is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Eagle Vision and Eagle Rock with an AVC encoded 1080i transfer in 1.78:1 (for the most part). The contemporary segments of this documentary pop quite nicely in this high definition presentation, with excellent and accurate color and pleasing fine detail. There is also a wealth of archival material in various film stocks and aspect ratios, some of which frankly looks incredibly grainy, fuzzy and scratched, but which captures Ozzy and Black Sabbath in their prime. There is probably slightly more contemporary footage than archival footage throughout this documentary, so the bulk of this presentation looks rather sharp and presentable, though a couple of the weirdly lit concert sequences verge on posterizing now and then. The historical footage must be taken on its own terms and placed within a proper historical context. It's no great shakes from a quality standpoint, but it's fantastic to see some of this extremely rare footage nonetheless.

Ozzy Osbourne: God Bless Ozzy Osbourne Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

As is usually the case with these Eagle Vision/Eagle Rock releases, three audio options are included on God Bless Ozzy Osbourne, a DTS- HD Master Audio 5.1 surround mix, an uncompressed LPCM 2.0 stereo mix, and a standard Dolby Digital 5.1 surround mix. Both of the lossless mixes sound great, though potential viewers need to realize that this is really not a concert video of any sort, despite the fact that several nice, longer sequences of both Ozzy and Black Sabbath are included. Those segments offer really beautifully rendered fidelity, especially in the bombastic low end. But for the most part, this is a resolutely "talking heads" sort of piece, and all of the confessionals and interview segments are presented cleanly and crisply.

Ozzy Osbourne: God Bless Ozzy Osbourne Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Q&A with Ozzy and Jack (1080i; 19:16) is an interesting sit down with the father and son, though Ozzy definitely takes the lead here. He actually responds to some of the material that comes out in the documentary, like his older adult children saying he wasn't a good father.
• Deleted Scenes (1080i; 14:26) has some good supplementary material, including some nice additional information on Randy Rhoads as well as an alternative ending.
• Tribeca Film Festival (1080i; 4:07) has some footage from the film's premiere at the festival.

Ozzy Osbourne: God Bless Ozzy Osbourne Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I must confess I'm not the world's biggest Ozzy Osbourne fan, and so I didn't come to this documentary with much hope. What a pleasant surprise God Bless Ozzy Osbourne turned out to be, though. Full of fascinating insight into the hedonistic lifestyle (and consequences thereof) of the modern rock star, but more importantly showing how even a troubled soul can come to a semblance of self understanding and rectitude, this documentary is especially fitting as a cautionary fable after the recent tragic death of Whitney Houston. Ozzy comes off as a frankly really cool elder statesman of rock. As that old Frank Sinatra tune said, he's made mistakes, regrets, he's had a few, but he did it his way. With good video and excellent audio and some appealing supplements, God Bless Ozzy Osbourne comes Highly recommended.