Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)

What is art, and who is an artist? These questions keep coming up when viewing EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP, a brilliant documentary directed by the famous –or infamous—British street artist known as Banksy. But what is so brilliant about the film is that these profound questions about the nature of art are not specifically addressed. Rather, they are byproducts of viewing to any members of the audience taking their viewing experience seriously enough. This makes it all the more genius that anyone who doesn’t wish to dig this deeply below the surface can just enjoy EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP as a damn funny human comedy.

Not five minutes into the film, I wasn’t sure if I would be interested. The assembly of GIFT SHOP is certainly standard; there is nothing flashy or unique about the technical aspects of this documentary. But I held in there, and not moments later, something strange and wonderful started to happen when I realized that the film’s narrative contorts in unexpected and entertaining ways. And it only got more brilliant from there.

I’m being vague, but I don’t want to give too much away, either. So let me give you the basics.

EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP BEGINS with an odd Frenchman by the name of Thierry Guetta as its subject matter. Guetta has an obsession with videotaping everything, a habit that reminded me of the Friedman family documented in “Capturing the Friedmans,” another documentary that benefited tremendously from the happy coincidence of someone filming everything with no plans for the footage until someone else with editing skills came along to make something of it. Guetta up and decides one day that he is a “filmmaker,” and selects a topic to film; he decides to make a movie about the growing phenomenon of street art. He films everything he can find and the tapes pile up in his home, never to be sifted through. His wife rolls her eyes and demonstrates tremendous patience, raising the family while Guetta pursues his pipe dream.

The dream inflates when Guetta decides to pursue the “holy grail” of street artists, the elusive and mysterious Banksy, a British graffiti expert. Surprisingly, Banksy agrees to be filmed by Guetta, though he establishes specific guidelines about how he can be filmed on camera (typically, from behind). Because Banksy’s work exists “in a legal grey area” (his words), he demands that his identity stays protected but also feels that documenting his work has value because by its nature, street art is not permanent.

That, we come to believe, is a shame. It’s hard to watch GIFT SHOP without feeling something cross over in you. While at first one understands the illegality of graffiti and its defacement of public property, the opinion becomes cloudy when this graffiti is viewed. Is graffiti art? This surely is. Soon enough, the thought of this renegade artwork being painted over seems like more of a crime than its placement there.

GIFT SHOP really hits its stride at the moment when Bansky asks Guetta what became of the hundreds of hours of footage he captured. It seems that filming the acts of graffiti was more a way for Guetta to participate in the excitement of its creation than it was a definite assignment with an expected end result. Like many artistically-inclined people, Guetta procrastinates, reveling in the foggy air of being a part of something wonderful and having nothing to show for it. But at Banksy’s urging and in deference to his invitation to film his creating process, Guetta acquiesces and edits something together. The end result, some of which is shown in this documentary, is shit. It’s spastic and incoherent. Bansky, it’s clear, is pissed.

From this point on, the film is, in a sense, hijacked by Bansky, who tries to let Guetta down easily but also firmly suggests that if Guetta loves street art so much, he should go out and create it himself. Obviously, he’s not the filmmaker he thinks he is. But to everyone’s surprise, Guetta takes his idol up on his advice, and hilarity ensues when Guetta succeeds at Bansky’s dare beyond anyone’s wildest imaginations. There’s no doubt that Banksy, who has now turned the camera on Guetta, is pissed. Guetta is so unbelievably successful that street art is elevated to the stuff of collectors who fight over pieces at Southbys.

The details of how Banksy twists things around and what happens to Guetta once he starts to create the art he once observed from behind a camera’s lens are best left to be experienced by viewing EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP. The film raises all kinds of questions, not the least of which is the struggle to decide who the butt of the joke is here. What’s clear is that Bansky is angry with Guetta, first for leading him on and wasting his time, and then for succeeding at Banksy’s own craft. But this is not an angry film, either. It’s assembled in such a puzzle-like way that the humor comes through. It’s inherently funny that Bansky, the subject of Guetta’s film, is the one who ends up releasing a film – and Guetta is his subject. Upset or not, Banksy delivers a tone that is much closer to head-shaking disbelief than anger.

EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP is the kind of film that I could write about for days and watch repeatedly. It raises so many questions about the nature of art. I, for one, thought that many of Guetta’s works were garbage and even wondered how he could be considered an artist when he had a team of people doing so much of the work. I found myself saying, “hey, I could do that.” And maybe that’s just another reason why this film is so great. I don’t consider myself an artist, but after seeing it, I was left thinking, why not me?

What will likely be the real crime in all of this is that EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP will probably miss out on major awards in favor of the Michael Moore-flavored style of screaming advocacy filmmaking that is “Waiting For Superman.” And it’s true that that film is about something important in our country right now. But important is never fun; this is. More fun than I could have possibly imagined.

4.0 out of 4