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Exit Through The Gift Shop

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    Ian Jane
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  • Exit Through The Gift Shop

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    Released by: Oscilloscope
    Released on: 12/14/10
    Director: Banksy
    Cast: Banksy, Thierry Gutta
    Year: 2010

    The Movie:

    When Exit Through The Gift Shop starts, we meet Thierry Gutta, a thirty-something French immigrant who, along with his family, runs a very profitable vintage clothing store in Los Angeles. Thierry lost his mother at the age of eleven and since then has compulsively recorded everyone and everything around him on video. What starts off as just a bunch of obsessive home movies takes an interesting turn when he returns to France to visit his cousin who works as a street artist calling himself Space Invader, or just Invader for short. Invader makes mosaic pieces out of Rubics Cube parts that look like the video game creatures he has taken his name from and he places them in interesting places around Paris. This gives Thierry an instantaneous boner for street art and he starts videotaping his cousin doing his thing, which leads to him meeting and videotaping other street artists of varying degrees of notoriety, the biggest name being Shepard Fairey, who has risen to prominence thanks to his OBEY/Andre The Giant pieces and his now instantly recognizable Barrack Obama 'HOPE' campaign poster.

    Thierry gets these artists to consent to letting him shoot them under the pretense that he's making a documentary on street art - there's one big piece missing from his puzzle, however, and that's the involvement of a notorious English street artist who calls himself Banksy. One of the best known artists in the scene, Banksy's identity remains a closely guarded secret, and many will tell you that he doesn't even have a phone. Thierry tries to get in touch with him but has no luck until Banksy comes to Los Angeles to visit Fairey. They call him up, he starts shooting them, and he and Banksy hit it off. Thierry accompanies him on a bunch of different projects and eventually Banksy tells him it's time to show the world his documentary. The result is a haphazardly edited ninety minute mishmash that's essentially unwatchable called Life Remote Control. Unimpressed, Banksy tells Thierry to head back to L.A. and make some street art of his own while he takes the tapes and makes something worthwhile out of all of the footage Thierry has shot. Seeing this as a sign, Thierry takes on the moniker of Mr. Brainwash and sets out to launch the biggest debut gallery showing from a street artist in the history of the movement - but will he be able to pull it off?

    There's been some fairly loud rumbling claiming that Exit Through The Gift Shop is little more than a really well played hoax on the part of Banksy himself. While this hasn't been confirmed either way at the time of this writing, it's pretty hard to say without knowing anyone involved in the production if this is true or not. On one hand, there's the whole 'truth is stranger than fiction' which dictates that Gutta, who comes across as quite insane and completely obsessive compulsive, has to be real. You can't make a guy like that up, right? On the flipside, we don't really see Gutta doing much in regards to creating his own artwork. We do see him essentially running an art factory where a small army of graphic designers create pieces based on his direction, but his approach is one that seems very hands off. On top of that, there are moments where Gutta seems to be playing it up for the camera - at one point he injures his leg and rather than get a wheelchair or a pair of crutches he instead has an assistant push him around in a wheelbarrow. This doesn't discredit the film, but it does make you wonder if Banksy, with a lot of help from Fairey, are pulling one off on us.

    Either way, hoax or legitimate documentary, Exit Through The Gift Shop is entirely worth seeing. It gives us an interesting look at the art world, how completely cannibalistic it can be, how powerful influence can be and how that influence can go horribly wrong. We get a firsthand look at how even the most subvert counterculture can easily be mass produced and spoon fed to the masses. With humor and insight, the film shows an audience who probably won't be familiar with how all this works just how ridiculous things can and do get in the art world, even offering up some explanation as to why. On top of that, it showcases some great footage of some of the best street artists out there at work everywhere from Israel to Disney World to New York to Los Angeles to Paris to London.

    Video/Audio/Extras:

    Exit Through The Gift Shop is a bit of a visual enigma in that it was put together from a whole bunch of different sources, each of different quality. Therefore, it stands to reason that the footage shot on someone's cell phone is going to look quite a bit worse than Thierry's home movies which in turn aren't going to look nearly as nice as the professionally shot interview footage. Quality varies according to the source used for any given scene and the guerilla nature with which much of the footage was shot doesn't exactly lend itself to the best video quality around. That said, the disc is well encoded, there are no problems with compression artifacts to note outside of some of the macroblocking that is inherent in the low end digitally captured footage, and colors look pretty decent. This isn't a movie that needs to look like a reference quality feature presentation to work. Rather, the flaws inherent in the source material simply add to the effect.

    Audio options are offered up in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo options, with removable English subtitles included. The sound mix here is quite good, with the score really making full use of the 5.1 encoding and playing around really effectively with the front and rear channels. Bass response is good, it's tight and bouncy and adds some nice depth to the movie, while dialogue is generally very easy to understand, this in spite of Thierry's thick accent and Banksy's manipulated voice. Levels are well balanced and outside of some of the clips inserted into the picture, there are no problems with hiss or distortion.

    Oscilloscope have provided a few interesting extras on this disc starting with a collection of five deleted scenes entitled More Brainwashing (5:25). There's nothing in here that would have ultimately changed the movie but these clips are worth watching if you enjoyed the feature. A Star Is Born (7:07) is a look at one of Banksy's art exhibitions while Life Remote Control (15:00) is an edited down version of Thierry's documentary on street art, cut from its hour and a half length based on 'legal advice' and presented here for your viewing pleasure. B Movie (13:35) is an interesting look at Banksy's work and while it offers no insight into the man hiding under the hoody, it's a pretty cool glimpse into his creative process and probably the best of the video supplements on the disc.

    Special note should also be made of the packaging here - Oscilloscope houses the disc inside a fold out case that fits inside a cardboard slipcase. Also included inside the case are some postcards inserts, stickers and 2-D glasses that need to be worn to be properly understood.

    The Final Word:

    You don't have to have an interest in street art to appreciate Exit Through The Gift Shop - it's a thoroughly fascinating documentary that's part scene coverage and part personality piece that is funny, interesting, enlightening and engrossing. It'll certainly give you an interesting perspective on the art world and make you question how the public digests it. Oscilloscope's DVD looks about as good as it probably can given the nature of the material and it contains some pretty solid supplements, making this a very nice package overall.

    Want more information? Check out the Oscilloscope website by clicking here!
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