Be Kind Rewind: Hollywood and American Independent Cinema’s bastard child.

[digg=http://digg.com/movies/Be_Kind_Rewind_The_Hollywood_Indie_conflict]Evening fresh-faced finger lickers! Here’s a quick review of an indiewood flick doing the rounds for you. As I’m sure any film fan worth tuppence is aware Be Kind Rewind is the new film from Science of Sleep and Eternal Sunshine director Michel Gondry. The flick premiered at this years Sundance film festival and is being distributed by Focus Features.

Gondry’s comedy follows two slackers Jack Black and Mos Def who spend their days hanging out in the local video store in a dead-end town in New Jersey. After Black’s foolish character manages to wipe all the store’s videotapes the two are forced to recreate the Hollywood hit list using only their ingenuity and a VHS camcorder. Hilarity, as you would expect, ensues. However, evil city planning officials are moving to demolish the filmmaker’s slacker haven and build luxury apartments. In order to avoid the destruction of the video store the pair, with the help of the local community, set about making one final and totally original film to top them all.

While Be Kind Rewind entertained and made me laugh out loud on several occasions something was out of whack. Black and Def were well paired; the dialogue good; the cinematography was great and transition between the VHS-look and standard definition was well balanced. I also particularly like Gondry’s inclusion of the 2D elements in the comedy duo’s Hollywood remakes, a technique he took a good deal further in the sometimes-surreal Science of Sleep, which I loved by the way. However, I felt there was a comedy/feel-good balance problem. Rather than interspersing the comedy Gondry seems to have made a film where the laugh out loud comedy ends somewhere in the middle of the second act. He replaces the comedy with an often over pungent feel-good factor. The film turns from a slapstick fast paced comedy ride into an altogether different warm, fuzzy and dare I say it sometimes-saccharine picture. And as a result the film has somewhat lost its indie sensibility by the culmination of the third act.

Overall, this film begins with an indie feel but slowly develops a Hollywood scum on the surface. I don’t know whether this is because of the inclusion of a mainly Hollywood cast or the strange narrative shift. Either way the film leaves you with a confused taste in your mouth. While it delivers an American Independent cinema open-ended conclusion it does so while swimming in Hollywood sentiment. Perhaps that’s what Gondry was after… but I’m not sure he sold it to the audience.

K