David Bowie: The Last Five Years

David Bowie: The Last Five Years (2017) — BBC director Francis Whately's 90-minute documentary you can watch online on iFILM — covers the unexpected creative surge at the end of Bowie's life.

Bowie was largely absent from public life between 2004 and 2013. Then he released "The Next Day" without announcement, followed three years later by "Blackstar" — a record that landed on January 8, 2016, two days before he died. Whately speaks with producer Tony Visconti, actor Michael C. Hall (who played Thomas Newton in the Lazarus musical), and saxophonist Donny McCaslin, whose jazz quartet defined the album's sound. The film is a sequel to Whately's 2013 "Five Years," covering Bowie's 1970s peak; together they make the case that this last period was not a farewell but a deliberate final statement. Watch David Bowie: The Last Five Years (2017) online on iFILM.