What the three movies capture, which very few documentaries about an individual very rarely do, is the essence of Dee Dee Ramone. This was just an ordinary guy from Queens who ended up in the spotlight as a rock and roll star. He had no idea what to do with himself when he wasn't making music and turned to drugs to pass the time and fill the hours. On the one hand we see a guy who is honest enough to not make any excuses for his drug use and self destructive behaviour or to make out like it was some great romantic adventure. Yet, he also has the emotional maturity of a child who desperately wants to be liked, who lashes out when things don't go his way.
Perhaps Kowalski was able to create such an honest portrait of Dee Dee Ramone because he wasn't supposed to be the subject of the film. When he talked on camera there was none of the self-consciousness usually so evident when people talk about themselves, and perhaps that's because everything was being told in reference to someone else - in this case, Johnny Thunders. Although it's quite possible that Dee Dee would have been as candid even if he was the subject of the film, because at that point in his life he seemed willing to talk as honestly as was possible for him about any subject that the director wished. In the end, there's something quite sad about Dee Dee, and you wish for his sake that things could have turned out better for him than they did.
While the bonus CD is basically nothing more than extended versions of the the soundtrack of the two short films, it — along with the three short movies that make up History On My Arms — all contribute to forming this very complete portrait of Dee Dee Ramone. He may not be the tragic figure so many want him to be, but the man we meet in these films would only have laughed at that notion anyway. This is a very real, warts and all portrayal of one of punk's pioneers, that reminds us that there were human beings behind the noise and confusion trying to find there way through just like the rest of us.
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