From the Pompous Thomas 2010 Review Backlog!
Exit Through the Gift Shop: Fun and games with the street art underground or revenge documentary? How about both! This movie has two distinct halves. The first half of this super-low budget documentary is pure fun and games with our POV into the thrilling world of street art; the one and only Theirry.
Theirry films everything he does. EVERYTHING. Cooking, sleeping, walking, talking, working, playing. He's a goofy and lovable guy and the artists he meets through his street artist cousin are like Robin Hood and coolest kids in school rolled into one. The time we spend marveling at their cleverness and laughing at their hijinks is some of the most fun I've had watching a movie. The second half is a lot different.
In the second half, Theirry stops hanging out with famous street artists like Banksy and Shepard Fairey and becomes the engineer of an elaborate industrial/commercial street art machine. Theirry stops being the goofy guy holding the camera and becomes an object of scorn. It's hard to see the movie and street artists like Banksy turn on our hero like this, even if he does seem to deserve it. But then you remember that Banksy directed this movie. You have to wonder if we're really getting both sides of the story or if this is just Banksy's way of getting back at Theirry for being such a huge sell-out, man.
Cost/Benefit Analysis: I saw this movie for free, but I was planning on paying full price to see it. The movie's truthiness is a bit suspect, but it's still a good story, no matter what actually happened.
3 comments:
I really enjoyed this movie. The music was amazing and the film itself was fun to watch. I loved the story. I thought the ambiguity of the truthfulness added a lot to the movie. Matt and I spent hours (days) discussing what was real and what it all meant. And while we were visiting a mutual friend (Brittany Dwyer!) in New York we went to the Mr Brainwash show, Icons Remix. It was fun seeing his art, if you can call it that, in real life.
Hey Cara
How awesome was the Mr. Brainwash show? I would've loved to see that. Were any of the people at the show as clueless as the Los Angelenos in the movie?
You're absolutely right about (as you usually are) about the ambiguity adding something to the movie. I tend to simplify things when doing a writing rush job like I was here. I have no doubt that Thierry/Mr. Brainwash is a total shyster. His line in the beginning of the movie about selling irregular clothes as designer is pretty key, I think. I wish I had realized that I was watching a character assassination from the get go so that I could have prepared myself for the bias in the same way that you do when you watch a Michael Moore movie. (Note: I've never actually seen a Michael Moore movie)
How's the cupcake business?
The show was pretty awesome. There were two women who thought everything was AMAZING! They took photos of all the art and signed up for the email list. You could tell they were artsy because they were wearing scarves in June.
The cupcakes business is slowly working out. I started grad school, so I've been more of a student lately and less of an entrepreneur.
Keep up the movie reviews! I love movies!
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