EXPECTATIONS: Banksy made a film? Well, it will at the very least be interesting. Banksy is best known for his street art; politically charged graffiti that is also extremely stylish and aesthetically pleasing. Can he make a film?
REALITY: You know when you watch a documentary and it bugs you not knowing whether or not it was some kind of scam or a real, true to life documentation of events?? In Exit Through The Gift Shop it doesn't really matter either way.
Exit tells the story of Thierry Guetta, a French man who owns a clothing store and follows around street artists with his video camera. We are shown fantastic footage of many famous street artists at work around the world, all working in the middle of the night to evade capture from the authorities.
After a lengthy and interesting couple of acts showing us the 'real' street artists, Guetta decides he is going to make his own street art and put on an underground show in Los Angeles. Whether or not Guetta is real or just Banksy playing a prank on everyone is unimportant because the show was real, people's reactions to the mish-mash of art was real, and the cover to Madonna's Celebration album is credited to Mr. Brainwash a.k.a. Thierry Guetta.
My gut tells me that this is just a great documentary about street art made more interesting with a huge prank on not only the viewer but the public at large, but again that is unimportant. The story, character, and art of Thierry Guetta has become a part of popular culture and it is extremely interesting and entertaining.
*****
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