Jeen-Yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy Trailer: Kanye West's Life And Career Get The Netflix Documentary Treatment

Netflix is rolling out "jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy" with all the pageantry you'd expect for a Kanye West documentary. The streamer is billing "jeen-yuhs" as "a three-week global event," which will unfold in three acts, similar to its "Fear Street" movie trilogy last summer. "Act 1 (Vision)" premieres on February 16, 2022, which means the first two-thirds of this trilogy will be playing out during Black History Month.

Directed by Clarence "Coodie" Simmons and Chike Ozah, "jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy" is described as "an intimate and revealing portrait of Kanye West's experience, showcasing both his formative days trying to break through and his life today as a global brand and artist." Simmons first put a camera on West back in 1998, back when West was still just a young producer, "destined for greatness" and looking to bring what he describes as "a breath of fresh air" to the hip hop music scene. "The goal," Simmons says in the trailer below, "was to see how far his dreams would take him."

"jeen-yuhs," the title of which is obviously a play on the word "genius," held its virtual world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in January, and it will hold a special one-day engagement screening in theaters nationwide on February 10, 2022. Check out the trailer below.

jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy Trailer

In the trailer, we hear West say, "Let me explain my side of it." But while Simmons appears to have been a member of his inner circle, "jeen yuhs" isn't quite the hagiography you might think. It recently made headlines when the director refused West's request to have final cut over the documentary, saying, as Vibe notes: "God has the final cut." That plays right into the religious vibe in certain moments of this trailer, where we hear West's breakthrough hit, "Jesus Walks," playing, and also hear him attribute his success to "God's plan" and say that, hopefully, "with God's blessings," there should be no way for him to lose.

West can be a polarizing figure. It's entirely possible that someone reading this may have voted for him for President of the United States in 2020, since his name was on the ballot in several states as a candidate for the Birthday Party. While I didn't vote for him, I did discover some of his music a little later than most, since I'm about ten years behind American music trends, having left the States in 2010. I knew West's early material circa "The College Dropout" and "Late Registration" albums, but it wasn't until catching up on the best albums of the 2010s — in 2020 — that I discovered "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" and some of his more recent, gospel-inflected work with Sunday Service Choir.

For those of you who are still fans of West's music, at least, "jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy" promises to give a comprehensive, career-spanning look at his life. Here's the official synopsis:

Twenty-one years ago, Clarence 'Coodie' Simmons met Kanye West and saw something so special that he moved from Chicago to New York City to document Ye's journey to become the next great rapper. Neither of them had any idea where just how far that journey would take them.

"jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy" premieres on Netflix on February 16, 2022.