Daryl Hannah On Coastal, Her Intimate, Transformative Neil Young Documentary | Features | Clash Magazine Music News, Reviews & Interviews

Neil Young is one of modern music’s most storied figures, a songwriter who has inspired entire library shelves worth of criticism. Numerous

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Neil Young is one of modern music’s most storied figures, a songwriter who has inspired entire library shelves worth of criticism. Numerous documentaries have been made on his work, and – at times – you can be left wondering if anything truly fresh is left to be said on the man, the myth, and his music.

Yet new documentary Coastal does exactly that. A remarkable, intimate experience, it offers a glimpse of Neil Young as a person, showing his warmth and humanity, his laconic wit, and his need as an artist to embrace the new, and the unexpected.

An impactful, absorbing watch, Coastal creates an entire world for you to inhabit, built around bus journeys, soundchecks, chance meetings with fans. Directed by Young’s long-term partner Daryl Hannah – herself no stranger to either side of the camera lens – Coastal’s cinema verite approach allows the audience to become a fly-on-the-wall as the songwriter embarks on an unusual Coastal tour: smaller theatres, solo performances, and ever-changing set lists that focus on deep cuts, songs rarely (if ever) performed live before.

Coming to cinemas worldwide on April 17th, this is a unique insight into a transformational figure within the craft of songwriting.

Daryl Hannah graciously gave up her time to talk about the film with Clash.

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Some fans might not realise this, but you’ve been filming Neil Young’s career for a decade now, haven’t you?

Yeah I mostly film things for his archives, and sometimes I make his music videos as well. I’ve made a few other documentaries. It’s a comfortable collaboration.

From the outset you wanted this documentary to align with a cinema verite style – what attracted you to that mode of working?

Cinema verite documentaries are my favourite style. I tend to like them more than films that are just interviews, talking heads… I like it when you feel like you’re there. 

My uncle was a cinematographer, and he assisted on a number of films made by Haskell Wexler. I got to be an assistant on those, holding the boom!

I have so many people that I love… Agnes Varda, I just love the way she makes her films, and displays her perspective.

That’s ultimately what happened with this film, in that I wanted to be a fly on the wall but Neil kept talking to me, of course! Ultimately, even though I fought against it for months and months I opted to include some of those moments as they showed an openness, like a window into his soul. Against my initial instincts I ended up including them. It’s a lovely touch, in the end.

Neil Young is this storied, mythologised figure, but he’s also quite inscrutable – those off-the-cuff moments are really valuable.

I think you’re right… people do find him this mysterious, inscrutable figure. That’s why I decide ultimately to include those moments, so people get to see what a sweet and open person he can be. You see more of his humanity and less of the myth.

Was there anything you weren’t allowed to film?

He really has a lot of trust in me, and gave me so much creative support. Neil believes in me wholeheartedly, and I’ve never experienced that before in any relationship. He’s such an artist, and he understands that you need to be completely free as an artist, so he gives me the ultimate support and freedom. I didn’t even show him any of the rushes or anything until we were pretty close to done, because he wasn’t interested in having that kind of input into it. He wanted me to make what I wanted to make.

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The set lists each night were radically different – that much be an incredibly interesting thing to capture as a film-maker?

Yes it was, but also very challenging for me, in terms of the way that we were filming. It took place in relatively intimate theatres, so the audiences were quite close to the stage, and I felt it wouldn’t be appropriate to have a camera person in front of the stage because it’s a solo show. I wanted to keep as low a profile as possible. And basically, this is a no-budget film, so we only had three cameras to work with and we tried to place them as inconspicuously as possible. We’d watch Neil in the soundcheck, and try to guess what he’d play that night – and often get it wrong! He did know before the tour that he specifically wanted to play songs he rarely played, some he had never played. There were two pianos onstage, and sometimes we’d be lined up expecting one piano, and instead he’d pick up the guitar! When we were in the editing room, it wasn’t like we could take the whole show from every night – we’d only have certain songs from each performance. Our edit was defined by what we had to use.

There’s a moment in the film when Neil comments to the bus driver that a lot of fans only want to hear what they already know – there’s a note of frustration in there.

And it’s the truth, I think, for every artist. People want to hear their favourite song – the song they had played at their wedding, or one that reminds them of their loved ones. Everybody has that same issue. But Neil decided that he really wanted to feature songs people probably didn’t know, and it created this wonderful tour because audiences were just RAPT! I mean, you could hear a pin drop. And some of the theatres were pretty large, but you could hear every lyric. Some of the songs are pretty old, but it was like he was playing them for the very first time. And you feel the emotion all the more, as you don’t have expectations.

The editing process for something like this much be particularly involved…

When you’re making a documentary the film is really born in the editing room. You don’t know what you have until you’ve spent a lot of time in there! And that’s true of this film in particular.

When we got in there, I was horrified – we hadn’t looked at our dailies, and we found out in the editing room that one of the microphones on the bus had been accidentally placed over the engine… so it was inaudible! I was like, oh my gosh, we don’t have a movie! Thankfully, we found this wonderful girl who stepped in to save us, and somehow eradicate the engine noise. Some of the dialogue was lot, though – we shot a lot on iPhone which doesn’t have the best microphone, and Neil was never going to wear a microphone day-in and day-out.

But the editing process… it’s tedious, it’s boring, it’s hard but that’s where it all happens. Before we started filming I wasn’t sure if we would get anywhere, but it was a wonderful experience. I have so much respect for editors and the work that they do – I loved the process, and it was a great experience, but it took a long time.

It must be tough to leave some parts behind.

For sure. We cut out so many amazing moments. I had this idea for the pacing that I wanted from the film, a really strong idea. I’d been reading about this sad situation where people are getting shorter attention spans, the degradation of our brains due to cell phones. We lack the ability to be present, and to be in the moment. So I wanted to go directly against that, and to give the film this natural pacing, the natural pace of life. I wanted it to feel like real life, so I could lull people into being in the moment. Also Neil is very funny – it’s kind of laconic, but that’s the way dry humour works… and that type of humour is dependant on a slower pace of timing. So it was specifically edited to lead in to those moments of life.

There’s a brief but beautiful moment with Joni Mitchell in the film – fans are going to love that.

She’s such a great friend to Neil, and to me as well. I met her when I was 17, so I’ve always been friends with her. We just adore her. She shows up whenever she can, which is so nice. She comes to our screenings, and she came down to that show. At the end, she was singing louder than anyone else in the audience!

Neil is obviously going to be busy over the summer, are you coming to Glastonbury as well?

Yeah! I’ve never been. I’m excited to see it. I can’t wait!

And those plans to perform in Ukraine had to be shelved, sadly – will you be revisiting those plans in the future?

Oh I really hope so! I’ve been to Ukraine and I cannot tell you how much I adored the people I met there. I was there once for a film festival, and I brought my nephew, and both of us were in tears when we left, because we fell in love with everybody.

It was just so such an incredible experience. The people have such a great sense of humour and a love of life and a love of their independence and freedom… they don’t want to belong to Russia, they have a very specific identity, and they’re desperate to to keep it. I was there before the last attempt at annexing them, right in 2014 when Russia invaded them before, and was heartbroken by that attempt. And now this… it’s just absolutely horrifying. But both of us would really love to support the Ukrainian people in whatever ways we can. So I’m sure that we’ll try to reorganise that in the future.

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Without dwelling on the darkness in the world, does this heightening situation in the world add a certain intensity to your creative practise?

Oh 100%. I think that’s unavoidable now. Some people are driven by the fear and paranoia, and are somehow shut down by it… but I feel it’s really important to keep focusing on the things that you love. This movie is a really happy, feel-good movie. It’s important to spend time with people you love, or to just spend time in nature. Those are the things that make us want to fight for the things that we love. Having those moments of peace and joy remind us that in these dark times it’s critical to fight for what you love. 

As an activist, I make sure to refuel those coffers, because it can be overwhelming and it can be demoralizing and depressing… and while I feel all those things deeply, I do also make sure to refuel myself with the things that I love, so that I’m I have the energy to go out there and fight for them.

Neil Young is a hugely mythologised figure, with entire library shelves devoted to his work. What did you capture in this film, that people perhaps haven’t experienced before?

I think you really get a window into his soul. There’s a humanity that comes across that a lot of other documentaries don’t get into – even the ones that I’ve made, some of them are really only about his relationship to the music. And in this film, while there’s a lot of that as well, there’s also how he is as a human being, how he relates to his son, and to me, and to the audience.

To finish, you’re always busy across multiple fields, what else does 2025 hold in store for you?

Well, I’ve made countless music videos and documentaries, so I’m ready to evolve to the next level! I just finished writing a narrative screenplay, so that’s what I’m going to put my energies towards next… and try to get that made as a director. I co-wrote it with my best friend. So I’m excited about that!

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Coastal will show in cinemas worldwide on April 17th.

Words: Robin Murray

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