20 Feet from Stardom movie review (2013)

Clearly, this is a lady who is not to be ignored and, lucky for us, Neville takes Clayton's words to heart. The music is on and then some throughout this smartly put-together documentary that celebrates the glorious harmonies achieved in the days before the pitch-tweaking of Auto-Tune yanked the very humanity out of the process.

No machine, and few solo acts, could come close to the natural-born abilities displayed by Clayton, 64, and her soulful sisterhood that includes powerhouse pioneer Darlene Love, 72; bluesy bombshell Claudia Lennear, apparently ageless since the number is nowhere to be found; delicate dynamo Lisa Fischer, 54; singular sensation Tata Vega, 61; and fresh-faced phenom Judith Hill, 29, who was foolishly kicked off the current season of "The Voice."

Yes, male performers show up on screen occasionally, including clips of the late Luther Vandross, who started out as a backup for the likes of David Bowie (following the tradition of British rockers who recruited such sessions singers to make them sound "blacker") before becoming an R&B legend in his own right.

However, the premier purveyors of this art form tend to be African-American women whose fathers were preachers. They honed their communal craft in the church choir where the goal was to blend rather than showboat. You can hear the gospel-bred tradition of call-and-response from the samples of their work on the film's vibrant soundtrack, from Ray Charles' "What I'd Say" and girl-group-era "He's a Rebel" to Donna Summers' "Bad Girls" and Michael Jackson's "Thriller."

But as uplifting as the music is, the film most benefits from the participants' abundant gifts as storytellers. They provide funny, frank and unabashedly emotional first-hand accounts of what it is like to be a supporting player to some of the greats in the business. Neville also convinced an impressive number of insightful icons to sing the praises of those hired to enhance their performance with little recognition, including Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Wonder, Bette Midler, Sting and Mick Jagger, whose camera-ready charm stands in stark contrast to the honest and raw presence of the movie's less lauded subjects.

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