At the end of “In Whose Name?,” the Nico Ballesteros-directed documentary spanning six years of Kanye West‘s life, the rapper breaks from the narrative to confront the challenges of assembling the film. “We don’t know if we glued together the story,” West says in a voiceover. “If you’re documenting every almost waking moment and sometimes sleeping moments of my life and you don’t understand the throughline, then the world’s not going to understand the throughline. It’s just going to look crazy or it’s going to be one antic to the next antic, the way the media words it.”
There isn’t much of a throughline, though, for “In Whose Name?,” other than its linearity. The film attempts to thread more than 3,000 hours of footage collected between 2018 and 2024 into an unflinching portrayal of West, a perennial lightning rod for controversy usually sparked by his own hand. On its face, the doc maintains its momentum merely based on access — one might wonder why Ballesteros, who was 18 years old when he started filming, was permitted to shadow him — yet the film as a whole is as tedious and frustrating as West himself, a figure who is so deeply certain of his opinions yet wildly unmoored.
West declares upfront that “In Whose Name?” is a film about mental health, and it is, as a general framework. He declares that he’s been off his meds for months and finally feels like himself. But what “In Whose Name?” communicates most is that West is a public figure so conditioned by his celebrity that you’re left questioning if he’s Victor Frankenstein or the monster. Throughout the film, he’s surrounded by artists and political pundits who consistently coddle his every whim (Chris Rock, Pharrell Williams, Drake and David Letterman, to name a few). It’s clear that his celebrity is a tool that wields power over anyone in his orbit, enticing those looking for proximity to his fame or, more cynically, attempting to leech off it.
Very few have the gumption to push back on Ye, as he asks to be called. And it’s in those moments that he’s at his most human and the film succeeds. Swizz Beatz chastises West for wearing a customized MAGA hat during a studio session, while Michael Che confronts him backstage at a “Saturday Night Live” taping about comments he made on the show. “That was fucked up,” says Che. “Why are you going to call me out if I ain’t got a chance to say anything for myself?” West stutters as he responds before Consequence, a longtime associate, cuts in to ease the tension. (Cue an “SNL” producer asking for the footage not to be used because “that would be helpful for us.”)
Those who push back on West aren’t always met with evenhandedness, and several moments in “In Whose Name?” are genuinely shocking as he loses control. Early on, he unleashes a full-throated tirade against Kris Jenner over getting back on his meds, leaving her in tears. In Uganda, his cousin asks him not to bring up politician Bobi Wine. “Fuck you!” he suddenly screams. As she gets up to leave, he commands her to sit back down, and she obliges — a telling dynamic. “You’re trying to tell me what to do. You’re trying to change my mind. None of you can change! My! Mind!” he blares, stomping his feet with each word for emphasis.
Kim Kardashian, his now ex-wife, is a crucial figure in grounding West at his most untethered and comes across as the most rational figure in the film, or his life. She takes his temper in stride, yet we gradually see it weigh on her. (Their divorce is mentioned in passing.) In Uganda, she sits next to West’s cousin after his outburst, blotting tears with a tissue. “At some point, it’s a reality that people say no. People say no to me on a daily basis and I don’t just start screaming and throwing a tantrum. That’s just not normal.” “But that’s my personality!” he says. She responds: “But your personality was not like this a few years ago!”
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“In Whose Name?” is parsed out across three acts and an epilogue. It follows West along all the milestones we’ve witnessed as a gawking public, with unseen bits peppered in. We watch West visit the White House to meet with President Donald Trump, and are privy to textured, gorgeous footage of his Sunday Services. Ballesteros is on hand for when West joins Joel Osteen on stage at a megachurch and performs in a prison. The camera rolls as West lies on a futuristic bed with Elon Musk, awkwardly comparing relationship woes.
It’s inevitable, then, that much of the footage in the documentary has already been seen by the public. Even an intimate moment where West hires Kenny G to perform in a room filled with roses on Valentine’s Day — previously shown on social media — merely offers a different angle. For anyone who’s followed West for years, there’s not much revelation. Those seeking to understand the erraticism of his behavior, to find any grain of intention, are left with lengthy diatribes and self-aggrandizing declarations that you start to tune out. At one point, he tells a room full of architects, “I am Picasso,” and it’s hard not to meet it with a shrug.
At the end of “In Whose Name?,” West has lost his goodwill. AEG and Live Nation won’t offer him a tour. Las Vegas’ Sphere won’t return his calls. And yet, he’s “almost like a masochist.” He asks, should he have blown up his deals with the Gap and Adidas? The answer, he says, is yes. It’s a maddening yet fitting end to a film about a figure so consumed in his own hubris that he can’t see through it. “In Whose Name?,” consequently, can’t avoid the same fate.
From Variety US