A Song for All

Doc Presenting Princess Shaw looks at connectivity in the modern age

By Jessi Cape, Fri., March 18, 2016

When life gave her lemons, Samantha Montgomery made a YouTube channel. A New Orleans-based singer-songwriter, Montgomery – under the stage name Princess Shaw – posted videos of just about everything that came to her mind: soulful a cappella songs, funny musings, even painful, spoken-word diary entries. She explains, "Music is a very powerful release. It soothes the soul and you can just leave your body. It can take you to a beautiful place even when you're in a jacked-up place."

A multilayered story, Presenting Princess Shaw follows Montgomery as she makes her way through daily life working in a nursing home, gigging when she's able, and struggling to make ends meet. Cut to Kutiman, an Israeli composer who discovered one of Montgomery's songs. Using her gorgeous vocals as the central component, Kutiman weaves other musicians' YouTube snippets to create his latest project – all unbeknownst to the artists. And here's where it gets even more complex: Director Ido Haar was filming the whole time. He explains: "I told Samantha that I was doing a film about musicians and singer-songwriters who upload their work on YouTube. I didn't mention a word about Kutiman and his project. My intention in the film was to catch the moment of revealing the song as if there was no film being made, like it happened naturally."

"My biggest fear was that I might miss the moment of her discovering Kutiman's project airing on YouTube. ... I was overwhelmed by her response to it – it was really even more exciting than I ever expected." The power of that moment certainly transcends, but what makes this film truly magical is the accumulation of tiny moments in Samantha's world, and what it all means for her future. The documentary examines the complexity of human emotion and connectivity as a sort of microcosmic look at the realities of so many aspiring artists – a particularly poignant concept at a festival like South by Southwest.

"[Making this film] I was reminded how often there seems to be little correlation between talent and success," says Haar. "There are so many people with so much talent, original thinking, and unique voices. Most of them weren't born with the 'right cards in their hand' and don't really have the access or ability to break into the often-exclusive realms of music, art, and culture. What are the chances that we will hear about them?"

Haar continues, "Presenting Princess Shaw might propose some modest, momentary fix for that. It is not about stardom, but rather about the deeply human experience of being seen – an antidote to the loneliness and anonymity many can feel in a world that is constantly manufacturing new stars. But for me, above all, Kutiman, Princess, and all the musicians who appear in the songs suggest a kind of utopian path, where people from all over the world, especially those who are lacking representation and power, can share, create, express themselves, and maybe give a fight to the cruel, commercially oriented and unfair rules of the game that usually dominate in the worlds of music, art, and culture today."