Join the Hype Wagon

I'll cut to the chase: I want all of my friends to watch Exit Through the Gift Shop.
It's a documentary by Banksy. If you don't know who he is, I'll skip the superlatives so often thrown around and just tell you, basically, he's a famous graffiti artist.

I'm sort of delighted by this street art thing. Not obsessed--because I really don't know all that much about it. But just curiously delighted. So clever and intriguing. Witty and exciting. So to learn more about some of it and see some of it in action is just a lot of fun.

Just that--the first 20 minutes or so--would be enough for me. But then we get the extra surprise of this character, this wonderfully complex documentary subject that Banksy finds. Or did he find Banksy? Or did Banksy create him? And to what degree did Banksy create him? And what exactly in the world is going on here? No one is really sure, but it's so much fun.

And from there it opens the floodgates yet again on the art world just like My Kid Could Paint That and Who the #$&% is Jackson Pollock?. And if I were sticking around, I'd hold an all-day controversial-art-world-documentary festival with these three. And no one would get tired watching three movies in a row because all three are just as engrossing and involving and entertaining and question-raising and debate-sparking. In Banksy's own words: "This is from the frontline, this is watching an art form self-combust in front of you. Told by the people involved. In real time. This is a very real film about what it means to ‘keep it real’."

And after you watch it (which you should, don't forget), you'd do well to read this interview.

(It feels good to write about a movie again.)