Exit Through the Gift Shop (on DVD)

 Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)

directed by Banksy

[Well-known British street artist who keeps his real identity under wraps--even more undercover than the Wachowski Siblings 

filmography: no previous films]

  starring Banksy, Thierry Guetta, Shepard Fairey and Space Invader

 [all street artists]

ENJOYMENT: ***** (out of 5)

"Loved it"

    I had never heard of this film until a friend recommended it to me recently.  It's available now on Netflix instant view and it's less than 90 minutes long, so I jumped all over it.  To my astonishment, this was a brilliant and fascinating documentary.  If I told you what it was about, you might not be interested in it immediately.  However, the way that it's presented is like a piece of art, introducing the reason for the film and then taking interesting tangents that help to set the scene for its concluding chapter and main point for existing. I was literally floored by how interesting this documentary was, as I usually find documentaries dull and one-sided propaganda.  This film, however, introduces the culture of street art and focuses on the major players in this scene without trying to make a moral statement, like most of documentaries try to do.  Instead, this film's statement deals more with philosophical questions, like, "what is art," and, "what is good art?"  The film shows that street art, or glorified graffiti, has the same components and emotions tied to it as more conventional art.  The main difference, as this film points out, is the lifespan of street art. That, and the fact that most street art is illegal.  These two qualifiers is what makes street art especially interesting, and in Exit Through the Gift Shop we are offered a look into both the art and the artists behind the art. 

    
    Most of this documentary is filmed on a handheld camera, over many years in the life of the central character in the story, Thierry Guetta.  In this documentary, Thierry films everything that happens in his day-to-day life.  He's obsessed with filming.  One day he gets interested in his cousin, Space Invader's, art, which involves gluing animated Space Invader characters around Los Angeles.  Thierry follows Space Invader around for awhile, then meets other people, or artists, who do the same sorts of things.  Some artists paint murals on the side of walls or buildings, and others plaster humongous illustrations that they printed out at Kinko's.  Thierry captures all of this on film, and it becomes his new obsession.  Throughout the documentary, Thierry meets different artists and follows them doing different sorts of things, until he meets the street artists at the top, Banksy (the director of this film).  Banksy is the best in business, and Thierry learns much from him and their adventures.  The film then takes a twist that really surprised me, focusing again on Thierry and what becomes the object of his next obsession.  This gives rise to a bunch of interesting philosophical problems, and keeps you on an adventure through different kinds of mediums in art, and then becomes more broad and all-encompassing. All in all, you'll be flabbergasted and wondering about thoughts you might have held somewhat dearly, all while being enormously entertained throughout.

   Exit Through the Gift Shop is one of the best documentaries I have ever seen.  Like a good documentary should, I walked away with a different way of looking at life and art.  However, what made this film extraordinary is that it did not tell me what to think; it showed me things and I got to deduce an opinion for myself.  I loved this movie so much, I watched it again a couple days later with a friend and still thoroughly enjoyed it.  Exit Through the Gift Shop is a living, breathing piece of art, not just a documentary about art, but something incredibly beautiful in itself.  I could not recommend this higher!