The Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Is Seen in Concert and Recording His Latest Album in the Revealing Film, Coming to MPI Blu-ray and DVD on June 5,

John Mellencamp has scored dozens of Top 40 hits, has been Grammy-nominated 13 times, and is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but not even his biggest fans have seen the artist revealed in the intimate music documentary JOHN MELLENCAMP: IT’S ABOUT YOU. The movie, which follows the singer on tour and in the recording studio, comes to high-definition, audio-enhanced Blu-ray and DVD from MPI Home Video on June 5, 2012, with SRPs, respectively, of $29.98 and $24.98.

Over a career spanning 35 years, John Mellencamp has drawn inspiration from his native Midwest to create songs that speak to all of America and the world. His classics, like “Small Town,” “Jack & Diane” and “Pink Houses,” tell powerful, poignant stories of ordinary people trying to live their lives with meaning and integrity. JOHN MELLENCAMP: IT’S ABOUT YOU is the first inside look at the man behind those beloved songs.

The movie’s co-directors, famed photographer Kurt Marcus and his son Ian, travel along with Mellencamp on his 2009 concert tour with Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson. They also film the writing and recording of Mellencamp’s universally acclaimed 2010 album No Better Than This, the sessions for which took place at several American musical landmarks. We see Mellencamp at Sun Studio in Memphis, where Elvis Presley recorded his breakthrough classics, and recording (with a mono tape recorder more than half a century old) in the same San Antonio hotel room where legendary bluesman Robert Johnson created his seminal work.

The Markuses shoot in Super 8 to visually echo the authentic Americana that resonates in Mellencamp’s music. Along the way, the rocker reveals an emotional and contemplative side never before seen by the public, in a career-spanning film that becomes a soulful meditation on his beloved heartland.

JOHN MELLENCAMP: IT’S ABOUT YOU received widespread critical praise upon its theatrical release by MPI. “[Mellencamp’ music] digs deeply into the soil of working-class American life in songs that express the defiance, despair and nobility of people who refuse to go down without a fight,” wrote Stephen Holden of The New York Times. “Markus and his son capture the poetic melancholy of a mostly rural America with an eloquence that recalls the photographs of Robert Frank,” said Peter Rainer of the Christian Science Monitor.

Movieline’s Stephanie Zacharek called the movie “startling in its perceptions,” while The Wall Street Journal’s Joe Morgenstern called it “a touching little film.” And Gary Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times said it’s “an unhurried, visually compelling look at a man and his music – as well as of a bygone America.”

JOHN MELLENCAMP: IT’S ABOUT YOU

Street date: June 5, 2012

Prebook: April 30, 2012

SRP: $29.98 (Blu-ray), $24.98 (DVD)

Running time: 80 minutes

Not rated