A Lego Brickumentary

LEGOs have been the anomaly of the toy industry since their inception in 1949. While Mattel keeps it head above water with successful, universally recognizable toy lines such as Hot Wheels and Barbie, and Hasbro has had strong success with G.I. Joe, LEGO has found a way to solely capitalize on the versatility and incalculable possibilities of their construction toy. Even though LEGO has succeeded in spawning a variety of spinoffs, such as the ever-so popular and beloved "Bionicles" when I was young, LEGO Architecture, and LEGO Customs, LEGO really only sells one product, whereas other toy companies scramble to try and find the next successful thing to franchise.

Most childhoods I know were accompanied by a LEGO set or two; sitting right beside me as I write this review is a six-foot-long table, admittedly cluttered and disorganized as all Hell, of a variety of LEGO buildings, some erected from the directions out of the box and some from my imagination. As a child, I loved LEGOs and fondly recall making an event out of sitting beside my mother as we built a barrage of sets together. LEGOs were the quintessential gift for children due to the fact that you had the choice of adhering to the instructions that came with every set or exercise your creative freedom by building whatever you found to be enticing. The potential for a universe was at your fingertips and all you had to do was build it.

A LEGO Brickumentary is a film that works to articulate that point and show that LEGO conventions, warehouses, and "master builders," people that work to create record-breaking LEGO sculptures in addition to creating brand new sets, are just as limitless in their scope as the plastic pieces themselves. The creator of the toy was a Danish man by the name of Ole Kirk Christiansen, who created wooden toys in a factory during the 1940's, consistently having to erect new factories following the destruction of one after another in fires. Christiansen purchased a plastic molder upon its invention, marveling at the fact that the machine, while so primitive, could mold and create a wide variety of complex plastic pieces. He found that, when properly manipulated and detailed, plastic blocks could be created and used to construct many different things, which eventually lead to the birth of LEGOs.

The major invention to these multicolored blocks was the "clutch power" added in later, otherwise known as the tiny stubs and holes present on nearly every LEGO block, allowing for secure connectivity and easy transitioning between pieces. Fast-forward decades later and current LEGO engineers and master builders work to create stories and depth behind the characters they create in their new LEGO sets, allowing for a certain richness to come packed in with each construction set. Furthermore, licensed products such as The Avengers, Spider-Man, and Star Wars all found themselves converted to the multicolored bricks in a way that booned the company to record profits and notoriety, in addition to allowing children the freedom to take their beloved characters home in a way that wasn't as vapid as just a plain action figure.

However, our narrator Jason Bateman - who also voices an ordinary LEGO character in the film - tells us how that wasn't always the case. In the mid-2000's, LEGO almost found itself closing its doors, with record-low profits and middling success with their new lines of toys (IE: "Jack Stone" and "4 Plus"). One employee says, at that time, LEGO had become a very arrogant company, one that was hesitant to listen to customer feedback due to perceived superiority on the ends of the CEOS and the employees themselves. When that changed, however, product lines such as LEGO Architecture, a line of universally known and renowned buildings such as the Taj Mahal, Willis Tower, and Empire State Building condensed into LEGO form, and LEGO Customs, a website allowing you to conceive your own LEGO set and having the ability to vote on others for the potential of making it a real set, came to be.

A LEGO Brickumentary's core focus, however, is the fandom and the ostensible impossibilities in size, scope, and popularity LEGOs have achieved on a global level. We are taken into many different conventions, where LEGO fans hold their own competitions (IE: building a LEGO set without being able to see the set of the piece, building LEGOs while the pieces are inside of a bag, and so forth. In addition, we are shown the elaborate codenames that have been given to different pieces and fans of LEGOs, with "AFOL" ("adult fan of LEGOs") being the most common and "MOC" (my own creation) perhaps being the second most. Arguably the most humorous is the nickname for an attractive woman at a LEGO convention, known as a "one-by-five" because LEGO does not make a one-by-five piece.

Finally, directors Kief Davidson and Daniel Junge show us how LEGO is working to break records every day. We see the creation of a life-size ex-wing fighter, using over five million LEGO bricks, equating to more than eight tons of material. With that, numerous "master builders," engineers, and interior designers work to create and perfect the steel frame and structure behind the fighter.

A LEGO Brickumentary is, admittedly, fan service; similar to Plastic Galaxy: The Story of Star Wars Toys, anyone already acquainted and thoroughly in love with the product in hand will find themselves delighted by the film solely because of its existence. While corny when it focuses on Bateman's LEGO character, this is a fairly solid look into a company that continues to expand and shows no sign of slowing down, creatively or financially.

Directed by: Kief Davidson and Daniel Junge.

Parade of the Virgins! That's what I thought when I saw that "A Lego Brickumentary" (G, 1:33) focused mainly on adult Lego enthusiasts. Then I saw married couples and families in this documentary… so I couldn't use that particular line. Next I thought that I could just mock the adults whose main hobby was building with Legos as being simply uncool. That's when I saw award-winning singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran, "South Park" co-creator Trey Parker and Houston Rockets star Dwight Howard all extol the virtues of the plastic bricks. At that point… well, I was kinda led to take this documentary a little more seriously. And that was only the beginning.

The movie does begin at the beginning, explaining how Lego bricks were invented and became one of Denmark's most famous exports, but who knew that so many adults took those colorful little bricks so seriously? Jason Bateman narrates the documentary which spends most of its time introducing us to adults who have made Lego a way of life, and showing us many, many different uses for this construction "toy".

After we meet Lego "master builders" who are full-time employees of the company, the film introduces us to ordinary people in different countries who became self-made Lego innovators, some of whom have been welcomed into the Lego corporate family. There are also clubs and conventions for those who refer to themselves by the unfortunate-sounding acronym AFOL (Adult Fan of Lego).

Then things get serious. The documentary shows us how Legos have been used in modern art and to build a full-sized replica of a Star Wars X-Wing Fighter. Legos have even been used in city planning and in therapy for autistic children. Throughout the movie, an animated Lego minifigure ("min-fig" for short) pops up to provide moviegoers with explanations of the movie's main points, but mostly, this film is about the people, the surprising variety of people all over the world using Lego bricks in a surprising variety of ways.

"A Lego Brickumentary" follows several of these Lego-centered stories and brings some of them to interesting and satisfying conclusions. The movie was more interesting and wide-ranging than I thought it would be, but it was still not much more than a Lego commercial on steroids. The documentary is fun, but it plays out as a long visitor's center video at the Lego factory or one of the Lego theme parks. "B"

I grew up in Belgium, and as a young kid in the 1960s, LEGO was one of my primary toys. I must've spent hundreds of hours playing and building LEGO stuff. Then I passed on the love for LEGO to my young son here in the US 30 years later. When I found out that, if not parallel with, then certainly as a result of the smashing success of the (CGI, not brick-made) "Lego Movie", a documentary was being made about the LEGO phenomenon, I couldn't wait to see it.

"A LEGO Brickumentary" (2014 release from Denmark and the US; 93 min.) opens with seeing 3 LEGO minifigs on a space ship, and the narrator (Jason Bateman) telling us he'll explain later what that is about. Soon after, we get a LEGO 101 on the company's roots and history. But it's not too long before we finally get what we all came to see this for: bigger, better, ever more imaginative if not out-right exotic LEGO creations. Along the way, we get the LEGO celebrity fans (Ed Sheeran singing his hit single "Lego House", NBA player Dwight Howard, etc.). Co-directors Kief Davidson and Daniel Junge decide to keep things very light-hearted. There is only the slightest critical comment about LEGO, and even there, it's turned into a plus for LEGO (how the company turned things around financially by listening better to its customers). The best part of the movie comes in the second half, when the co-directors look at the possible therapeutic effects of playing with LEGO, and also where a Danish university math professor examines whether he can come up with a formula for finding how many different positions just 6 or 7 LEGO bricks can be used/interlocked.

In the end this film is nothing more than an unabashed love letter to LEGO. It's pleasant (to see the LEGO creations) but it's also devoid of any critical tone, and hence there is also no strong narrative that pulls you in, reason that I rate this 6 stars. The movie opened just this weekend at my local art-house theater here in Cincinnati. The early evening screening where I saw this at was not particularly well attended, which really surprised me. Given the strong brand that LEGO is and the very positive response to The LEGO Movie, I would've expected more people for that on its opening weekend. If you are a LEGO fan, you should definitely check this out, but you should also keep your expectations modest. If you are not into LEGO, I'd suggest you check out something else to see.

A Lego Brickumentary (2014)

*** (out of 4)

Jason Bateman narrates this somewhat long-winded by highly informative documentary about the history of LEGOs and why everyone loves them so much. The documentary covers how the company got started, the early troubles with fire and then goes into detail about how the company evolved over the decades to become a global phenomenon. We get interviews with fans, master builders as well as people who have a dream job of creating new models.

If you're a fan of LEGOs then you'll certainly love this film as it really does tell you everything you need to know about the company and its fans. The documentary does a very good job with the history but it also gives you a good idea of what they plan on doing in the future including how they got fans involved with what they come up with . We get to see some of the amazing large creations that superfans have come up with as well as some of the fan-made movies.

"LEGO toys build anything. Especially pride." LEGO

A LEGO Brickumentary is a memorable documentary about one of the world's most successful businesses devoted to only one toy, but perhaps the most creative toy ever devised. Although the doc could be considered an extended ad for the little building blocks, and in a way it is whether the filmmakers mean it or not, the film is a colorful—in all senses of the word—history. Its founders and artists are more creative and enthusiastic, I suspect, than even lucky Google employees.

Or maybe even eccentric: the founder, Ole Kirk Christiansen, kept building new factories after at least three in a row burned down, the first one the original LEGO factory in Denmark. That joyful determination pervades the enterprise, where artists and scientists collaborate (Lego is a model of creativity sharing) like brainy kids given their first Gilbert chemistry sets.

If one doesn't work for LEGO, it doesn't mean you aren't invested in the product: Brickartist Nathan Sawaya in Manhattan claims to spend more than $100,000 a year on the bricks. His full-size human and animal LEGO artworks show his investment and enthusiasm as well as mesmerizing subjects.

It's worth seeing if only for the grand creations such as a full-sized plane and a village so beautifully appointed you'll want to shrink just to live there. If I sound rhapsodic, then so be it, for I am good with following the instructions when my grandson Toby and I put a themed model together. I leave digging out old bricks to create something unique to Toby.

If you loved The Lego Movie, this doc will show you the models used in that lovable film, and if you wonder what AFOLS is (Adult Fans of LEGO), or if you're curious how LEGOs are used in therapy, then sit back and relax with this unusual Brickumentary.