General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20264 min read

Meeting People Is Easy

Meeting People Is Easy is a 1998 documentary film directed by Grant Gee that follows the English rock band Radiohead on the world tour for their 1997 album OK Computer.¹ Rather than a conventional concert film, it is a fragmented, impressionistic portrait of the band's exhaustion under the pressures of sudden fame, built from backstage footage, interviews, press conferences, and concert recordings.²

Key fact	Detail
Subject	Radiohead's 1997-98 world tour promoting OK Computer, covering Asia, Europe, and North America¹
Director	Grant Gee, who had previously directed the band's "No Surprises" music video³
Performances charted	104 over the course of the tour²
US release	Wide release March 26, 1999 by Seventh Art Releasing; domestic gross $51,282⁴
Recognition	Grammy nomination in 2000 for Best Long Form Music Video⁵; included in Rolling Stone Australia's list of the 70 greatest music documentaries⁶
Critical scores	83% Tomatometer (6 reviews) and 85% Popcornmeter (2,500+ ratings) on Rotten Tomatoes¹
Availability	Free to watch in the OK Computer section of the Radiohead Public Library⁷

Spoilers

Content and style

The film follows Radiohead, Thom Yorke, Jonny Greenwood, Ed O'Brien, Colin Greenwood, and Phil Selway, through large concerts and extended press conferences that take a physical and mental toll, with Yorke having a particularly difficult time dealing with stardom.¹ Over the course of 104 performances it charts the band's growing apprehension toward the price of celebrity and their increasing disillusionment with the rigors of touring.²

Form. The film deliberately abandons the conventions of the "rockumentary." It uses quick cuts contrasted with stills and slow tracking shots, and mixes color with black-and-white video, creating a chaotic impact that echoes the band's sonic ambiance; the soundtrack layers interview samples, songs, and sounds of metropolitan cities.¹¹ Audio bleeds and overlaps in a constant chatter of reviews and commentary, including journalists asking questions such as "What is music to you?"¹² Live performances of nearly all the songs from OK Computer appear, usually in brief snatches, so that lyrics to songs like "Lucky" and "Karma Police" take on sardonic subtext as commentaries on the band's growing isolation.¹² Gee has cited Chris Marker's essay film Sans Soleil as an influence, a film he bought on VHS in New York in 1997 during the tour.¹³

Production

Grant Gee, a self-taught director and cameraman, first met Radiohead early in 1997 during pre-launch preparations for OK Computer, after directing their "No Surprises" video.³^•⁸ The band gave him free rein to film what he wanted on tour.³ The project was never commissioned as a documentary; Gee kept submitting proposal after proposal in order to keep the cameras rolling.⁹ He shot with Super 8 and hand-held video cameras as the band toured through 1997 and 1998.¹⁰

Release and reception

The film played a limited theatrical run to sold-out houses before a home video release on May 4, 1999.¹⁴ The Numbers records a wide US theatrical release on March 26, 1999 by Seventh Art Releasing, with a domestic gross of $51,282 and a 99-minute running time.⁴ Rotten Tomatoes lists a theatrical release date of March 20, 1999 and a 1h 38m runtime.¹ It was nominated for a Grammy in 2000 for Best Long Form Music Video.⁵

Critics have consistently read the film as an anti-tour document. Rolling Stone Australia called it "the perfect visual embodiment of alternative rock's 'success = sucks eggs' mantra," turning arena stardom into "a psychological horror movie."⁶ Salon described it as the quintessential 1999 rock documentary in the way that Gimme Shelter was for 1969, as much about a moment in time as about the music.¹⁴ A 2001 campus review noted that it functions as a visual companion piece to the mechanized attitude of OK Computer rather than a typical tour film.¹¹ Some reviewers warn that its deliberate drudgery makes it a slog for viewers expecting a concert film.¹⁵

Legacy

The documentary is frequently cited as context for Radiohead's drastic change of direction on their next album, Kid A, with viewers describing it as showing a touring band pushed to their edges and a frontman at the limit of his sanity.¹⁶ It was later released as part of the band's online archive, the Radiohead Public Library, where it is free to watch in the OK Computer section.¹³^•⁷

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026