Exit Through the Gift Shop (Banksy, 2010)
This starts out very interesting and only gets more fascinating as it progresses. It feels like a tragedy at times, but then it turns out it's a farce. It's incredibly specific but ends up being about big subjects like art, celebrity and authenticity (I haven't seen Copie conforme but I would wager these two would make a good double bill)... we have a clear point of view here, that is to say Banksy's, and there was a point in the film where I felt a bit at odds with him. Specifically when Thierry shows him his attempt at cobbling together the footage into a documentary, his reaction seemed excessively dismissive to me, and the brief extract we got from "Life Remote Control" made it seem quite interesting, a genuinely unique piece of avant-garde cinema. So when the film presents Thierry, now Mr. Brainwash, as a derivative hack, a cautionary tale about the shallowness of the contemporary art scene, I wonder. Is his art as uninteresting as it seems, or do I think that simply because it is presented that way, much like the people going to that "Life is Beautiful" expo may only think it's great because it feels like the thing you're supposed to feel in that context ? I've sometimes felt that Banksy's own work was of that caliber, and my view on art is generally that there is no objective value, only what an individual feels and thinks when and after encountering it.
These questions are what make this more than an entertaining foray into the world of street art, more than just the story of a weird, interesting guy. And I suppose it makes sense that it makes people question the authenticity of the documentary itself, though that seems quite far-fetched to me. It certainly never occured to me watching it that it might be a hoax, and the limited information I've seen on this seems quite unconvincing... but of course you would doubt it, because the film invites that line of reasoning, purposefully or not. It doesn't matter at all of course, but it's food for thought in a captivating and entertaining package.
8/10