I just finished watching Exit Through The Gift Shop, one of the films nominated for a 2011 Academy Award for Best Documentary. I was able to watch it on Netflix streaming, I suggest you do the same, it was pretty entertaining and put some things that have Boston connections into a bigger context, namely the Shepard Fairey vandalism case.
I won't sum up the movie or really even critique it as a film, I just am eager to release some emotions about the content before I take a shower and go to a brunch with real people who are smarter than more thoughtful than me.
Man, art, huh? What do you say? Within eyeshot of me right now is the following art, in my living room. And I am just using art b/c I don't know what else to call it.
> An It's A Wonderful Life movie poster
> a wall scultpure of 9 people riding their bikes
> an old tea blanket (no idea what to call it) from the mid 80s that explains the rules of Cricket to a non-cricket playing country citizen, its ironic and intentionaly confusing
> a painting given to me and Alison as a gift from our friend Josh for our wedding
> a painting made by alison's aunt of Newport, where we were married
> 2 astrological pictures that correspond to me & alisons signs
> I consider the Kermit playing a banjo on a log sittong on our side table art as well
All of those things have particular meaning to Alison & I, we were not driven by any factor besides personal "yes please" on those pieces. When you see people pursuing art, talking about art, wanting art, or creating art for any other reason than a personal piece of joy, it really starts to wear down on you.
Exit Through the Gift Shop is an hour and a half of the other side of art - its a cynical look at artists, and the junk that they create, but mostly how awful people who pursue art for any reason other than personal meaning are. I don't think the movie intended to be that, and if you watch it you may feel completely different, but that's how I saw it.
The first 40 minutes are spent trying to get you to buy into the fact that Street Artists are anything but vandals - they aren't, they are listless litterers with a great deal of talent for the thing they are trying to produce. I wish they were doing something useful like saving the whales or selling sneakers, like me.
To be completely transparent, these guys tried to deface Big Thunder Mountain in Disneyland with their vandalism, and that made me mad, so my judgment probably isn't very viable in this case, but you'll see. They also then made it sound like putting a fake guantanamo bay prisoner near the tracks of Thunder Mt. should be understood by all, and anger by the Disney Land security force was unwarranted.
But anyway, now that I get that out of my system....the rest of the film is the "What is art?" argument, which is a valid one, but it really rests on the fact that those seeking fame, fortune and celebrity the quickest way possible seem to always find the shortest path through art. They either create, like the subject of the flim, or purchase, like the celeb-hungry people who lined up at the art show at the end to purchase assembly line nonsense, created by interns, rather than the artist himself.
The funniest thing about it though is the vitriol that this dude's contemporaries feel towards him. They attack him like he has no right to subvert the whole process - the subject is someone who is taking all the shortcuts to millions, and the fellow vandals he associates with can't handle it. They think their fake names and hooded sweatshirts give them some sort of stamp of approval - as if spraypainting on a public or private building at midnight every night for 7 years builds up some inherent bank of carnival tickets that can later buy you credibility in the real world.
I enjoyed the film. I really did. I found it entertaining, and I don't know if I found it entertaining in the way the filmmakers wanted me to - or if I also took the shortcut and quit on connecting with the subjects early on, so I could poke fun of them later in my blog, but either way I recommend it, and I am not sure how it can be topped by the other 4 nominees - but I should see them before I speak.
Here is a trailer for the film
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