One simple way to think of Kanye West is as a genius stuck in the body of a child who\u2019s always on the verge of a tantrum. He takes out his crayons, scribbles on a napkin, then declares the result a masterpiece\u2014and often, implausibly, it is\u2014and yet he may tear up the napkin a few seconds later if his mood changes, or if he receives anything other than instant and unmitigated praise. In the new documentary \u201cIn Whose Name?,\u201d an intimate chronicle of West\u2019s long fall from grace, from 2018 to 2024, we see this pattern repeat again and again, at times almost literally. While being driven to the White House for a televised Oval Office meeting with President Trump, West, in much the same tone that he used while crashing Taylor Swift\u2019s acceptance speech at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, shouts over his go-between, Jared Kushner, \u201cI need to go the exact way that a foreign dignitary would go!\u201d In Uganda, on a safari vacation with his then wife, Kim Kardashian, an entourage, and an extremely attentive security detail, West, wearing a bulletproof vest overnight and practically vibrating with paranoia (\u201cI don\u2019t feel comfortable here\u201d), makes everyone pack up and fly back to the U.S. (One thing the documentary corroborates, if it wasn\u2019t already clear, is that it took superhuman reserves of patience for Kardashian to stay married to West as long as she did.) He refers to \u201cmy mental health,\u201d and to medication that he has been prescribed but has decided not to take. (The cover of his 2018 album \u201cYe\u201d reads \u201cI hate being Bi-Polar its awesome.\u201d)<\/p>\n
In Basel, Switzerland, he walks around with the architect Jacques Herzog, who showers him with platitudes about timeless spaces and organic forms. Then they sit for a meeting with some of Herzog\u2019s associates, and West\u2019s mood suddenly turns combative. He makes a few barely coherent remarks, then turns to one of Herzog\u2019s female associates and demands her reaction. \u201cNot what are you thinking\u2014what are you feeling?\u201d he says. \u201cAnd when\u2019s the last time you actually had a feeling?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m excited,\u201d she says, sounding terrified, \u201cbecause I want to understand who you are.\u201d The backing score is a dirge-like drone, treating West\u2019s casual bullying like the approach of a stalker in a horror film. At one point during this scene, West is sketching something (the shape of a roof?) and, at the merest insinuation that his sketch is not a masterpiece, he tears it up. \u201cI\u2019m not really asking your opinions,\u201d he tells the architects that he has flown to Switzerland to meet. \u201cI know I\u2019m right.\u201d He goes on like this for a while, adding, \u201cI am Picasso.\u201d Picasso was also a megalomaniac, but at least he was self-aware enough to stick mainly to visual art. In the documentary, West spends months flying around the world, talking about his plans to design a church, a school, a \u201csustainable city that runs off of air, fire, earth, and water\u201d\u2014almost everything except his plan to make another good album.<\/p>\n
For now, the only way to see \u201cIn Whose Name?\u201d is to go to a movie theatre. At an afternoon screening on opening weekend, the Regal Union Square was about half full. Most of the crowd seemed to be Kanye completists, maybe, but not Kanye loyalists, if there are any of those left. When they laughed, they seemed to be laughing at West, not with him.<\/p>\n