Most critics come down in favour of Gimme Shelter, though not by a wide margin. The praise gathers around the Maysles brothers and Zwerin’s construction: the film moves from tour footage towards the Altamont concert with a dread several reviewers find hard to shake, and it does so without commentary or talking heads. Jagger’s performances are singled out again and again, mesmerising on stage and withdrawn off it, and more than one critic ranks the film among the best rock documentaries made.
The reservations are about ethics rather than craft. Pauline Kael in The New Yorker argues the film shapes events to let the Stones and the filmmakers off the hook while trading on the violence, and Time Out faults it for staring at Jagger and never asking what the musicians owed the crowd. The New York Times finds it skilfully shot and edited but bleak to the point of being unwatchable. The spread is wide, from outright dismissal to landmark.