“Be Kind Rewind” is a film for anyone who has ever been even the least bit enchanted by the inspirational magic of Hollywood’s finest technical wizardry. No matter how offbeat or fanciful things became, I couldn’t help but feel enamored by the production team’s ingenious approach to recreating some of the industry’s most unforgettable pictures. Whether you’re twenty-five or fifty-five, you’d be hard-pressed to find yourself not admiring the uncorrupted sentiment behind director Michel Gondry’s innovative cinematic daydream and I can only hope that it gains a stronger audience on DVD.
Taking a page out of the Surrealist’s Handbook, Gondry takes an otherwise loopy scenario involving a man whose brain becomes magnetized and transforms it into a sweet, good-natured meta-comedy that had me smiling throughout its entire one-hundred and two minute running time.
Jack Black and Mos Def make a winning on-screen pair of small town eccentrics and provide just the right balance between heart and absurdity to keep the film from experiencing an early downfall. Since they could actually pass for a couple of lumbering video store clerks from Passaic, Gondry doesn’t have to go out of his way to make the viewer believe that what they’re watching is plausible.
Had a showy A-list cast attempted to bring this story to life, I don’t think it would’ve survived much past the developmental stage, because Black and Def’s fervent enthusiasm for the material appears difficult to match.
Like most of Gondry’s finest work, this one didn’t receive the expanded release it deserved. While audiences were off indulging in tedious debris such as “Jumper” and “Semi Pro,” this quiet treasure struggled to crack the top-10 at the weekend box office and is now relegated to the shelf at your local video store. Here’s one tape I hope doesn’t get erased.
- *** out of 4
If anyone can offer a compelling reason as to why we needed a soulless, Americanized version of “Shutter,” I’d love to hear it.
Seriously, can anyone justify the creation of such a dense, mind-numbing excuse for a thriller that has absolutely no exhilaration whatsoever? I’m still waiting.
Rather than make you sweat it out, I’ll just go ahead and say that no such rationalization exists and let you in on just how insipid this film turns out to be.
Joshua Jackson and Rachel Taylor play a newlywed couple who travel to Tokyo and begin seeing the spirit of a dead woman in their photographs. At first, they have no idea who she is, but it’s later revealed that she’s one of his old girlfriends who never quite let go of the relationship. Is she really appearing from beyond the grave to terrorize them? Well, it’s either that or someone has been knocking back a little too much sake for my taste.
Then again, does it really matter? The so-called terrifying resolution to this tale is so utterly inept that it wouldn’t even be cruel if I revealed it right here, so before you let the trailer suck you in, take a deep breath and think carefully about what you’re about to do.
- * out of 4
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