Be Kind Rewind (2008)

Robot karate

          Essential plot rundown:  Jack Black and co. must remake popular Hollywood films to save their business.  Before I watched this, I had heard some negative reviews, so I went into it kind of cautious.  But it turned out to be one of the better comedies I've seen in a while.  Probably the biggest thing that separates this from other, modern comedies is it's lack of filth.  Most comedies are all about sex and fart jokes.  Be Kind Rewind, however, is super clean.  There is one quick conversation that revolved around sex, but it is super quick and then over.  It is a fairly clean comedy.

          The idea of remaking all of these different movies was particularly interesting to me as a filmmaker.  They remake movies such as Robocop and Ghostbusters with literally no budget.  So I found it really cool to see how they did the different SFX.  They would be shooting a movie and I would think:  Hey, that's a good idea.  I'm going to have to try that.  There are two montage-esque scenes of them making their movies.  The first one was really good; the second not so much.

          There were a quite a few parts where I laughed out loud.  But there were also a couple of times where the jokes fell flat.  Jack Black and Mos Def both did good jobs in their roles.  Not also is it funny, but it is also a heart warming (is that the right description?) tale of a community coming together.  And it embodies the spirit of independent filmmaking.

          One of the things that I didn't like about the movie was how they incorporated Fats Waller into the film.  Throughout the movie, they show clips of a home movie about Waller.  I didn't understand why Mos Def was dressed up as a fat pianist until the end of the movie.  Even though it made sense at the end, the clips still felt out of place during the movie.

          There is also an implied relationship between Mos Def and Danny Glover's characters with the owner of a competing video store.  He acts like he knows them, but there is no explanation.  There is also a scene that shows him down on his luck but there is no reason given.  The filmmakers start develop him a little; enough to make you ask questions, but not enough to answer them.

          Overall, it is definitely worth watching.  The director, Michel Gondry, as remade the trailer in the same vein as those done in the film.

     HERE it is.

     But that's just my opinion...