Kanye West wasn't always infamous. Before he threatened Pete Davidson, ran for president, married into the Kardashian dynasty, cut into Taylor Swift's speech or called George W. Bush a racist, he was an aspiring producer and rapper in 1990s Chicago with boundless talent and potential.
Netflix's intimate and often heartbreaking docuseries "Jeen-Yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy" chronicles the impressive rise and later stumbles of West, piecing together more than 21 years' worth of footage shot by the artist's friends and documentarians, co-directors Clarence "Coodie" Simmons and Chike Ozah. The four-hour-plus docuseries, which will be released in three parts over the next three weeks, with the first act, "Vision," released Wednesday, is not a polished Kanye spectacle. Coodie & Chike, as they're credited, have said that West was in the loop during the production process, but this is not a Ye-approved final cut. Which is precisely why it's worth watching.
This fly-on-the-wall series is quiet and understated in comparison to its subject, applying the intimacy of a home movie to the evolution of West's music virtuosity, his outsized sense of self, his perpetual need to achieve more and his mental health struggles. Narrator Simmons started filming West when the beatmaker was 21 because "he saw potential" and hoped to make a "Hoop Dreams"-style documentary.
