Jonathan Shaw sees himself as an eccentric rebel; he sees himself as Charles Bukowski, as Hunter S. Thompson, as Jack Kerouac, as Anthony Bourdain, but he is just Jonathan Shaw, a true original in his own way. Scab Vendor is the inside scoop about the growth of tattoo culture from something bikers and sailors had to something rock culture brought into the mainstream. Through colorful illustrations of Shaw’s tattoos, the tapestry of the skin and instrument of the needle write their own story.
The son of celebrated clarinetist and jazz figurehead Artie Shaw, Jonathan Shaw began life with certain advantages. These are kindly admitted out front. What the documentary is saying about this is that despite the silver spoon he was born with, Shaw was comfortable among all walks of life, and fit in best with the rough-hewn clientele that frequented his New York City shop, Fun City Tattoo, the city’s oldest tattoo shop, predating the body art as a legal practice.
Shaw, like his father, is also notably a good writer and has a distinct voice. He edited key tattoo magazines that spread the art form to the world and became a sort of hard-nosed socialite himself.
The impetuous for this way of life was that, after spending his teenage years addicted to heroin and in delinquency centers, Shaw met Charles Bukowski who gave him some life-changing advice: before you can create you must go “fucking live.” And that’s what he did, he went and “fucking lived” hard and fast, journeying from Los Angeles to Rio de Janeiro, where he plied his trade while doing some blue collar work around some sailors.
The documentary is amusingly narrated in the style of the old Gonzo Journalists. The blood of Hunter S. Thompson is smeared over the page of the scripted narration, it’s a bit predesigned and packaged, as this radical life lived on the fringes, but that’s also really the story Shaw has to tell.
Scab Vendor is a fine documentary. It’s well-made and eschews conventional formats. We’ve moved away from simple talking heads-style documentaries and the aesthetic interests of directors Lucas de Barros, Mariana Robles Thome are adventurous enough to sell the Gonzo-journalism style of tripped-out self-reportage. At 90 minutes, Scab Vendor is occasionally confused, like as to whether the direct association with Jonny Depp and the Shaw’s inspiration for Captain Jack is really a good thing (it’s notable, and headline-worthy, but a questionable association now), but the doc has to tell the story that is in front of it, and does so successfully, and with interest.