Whether you like this film depends on whether you like Jimi Hendrix. If you believe, as I do, that Hendrix remains the reigning creative genius of electric guitar 32 years after his death (he would have been 60 this November), you’ll love it, even though as filmmaking this is essentially a point-and-shoot affair. It doesn’t matter that the 1970 Isle of Wight concert Blue Wild Angel captures in its entirety isn’t one of Hendrix’s best, or that he struggles with the sound system and his own elephantine volume (which at times causes uncontrolled squealing). What’s most important is the consistent, close-up, on-stage view of Hendrix at work as he cues his bandmates, drummer Mitch Mitchell and bassist Bill Cox, and lets his heart and fingers run their blues-soaked ballet over the strings of his guitar.

Some of this footage, mostly the 18 minutes that precede the concert and put it in context ("Behind the hippies is black power, and behind that is communism," an old-coot islander crows), has been seen before in director Murray Lerner’s Message to Love, his documentary of the entire festival, and in other Hendrix films. But it is improved (that includes the notoriously poor sound, which is fixed up to Dolby 5.1 quality), and most of Hendrix’s performance hasn’t been shown before.

In his psychedelic togs, Jimi looks like a lanky tie-dyed butterfly with an Afro nonchalantly chewing gum as he fires off incendiary solos and woodchopping rhythms. A few songs seem tossed off, but there’s an exploratory "Machine Gun" that highlights the group’s improvisational abilities, with its mutating rhythms giving way to feedback sonatas. Everyone could pass on Mitchell’s three drum solos, but diehards will thrill at the three numbers Hendrix plays on his rarely seen Gibson Flying V rather than his trademark Stratocaster, including a slow, elegantly squeezed "Red House."