I take very seriously the whole process of consuming or taking part in artistic expression. Consequently, I also take very seriously the act of reviewing a movie feature, either with a rating on a website or with a written essay about it.
If one cares to check my rating history, it's easy to realize I'm not one to give away 10 stars ratings that easily. Great movies which are universally praised haven't got it. To get a 10, a movie has to hit all the right notes with me.
"David Chappelle's Block Party" did it - but I'm not surprised. Only one director managed to get 4 of his movies rated 10 on my list. This means I'm putting Michel Gondry as the best director of all times, over the greats such as Tarantino, Gilliam, Kubrick, Hitchcock, Robert Wise, the Coen brothers and so many more, including Godard, Renoir or Scola.
Those who know me are aware that I hate what I call "fanboyism" (i.e. the culture of idolatry) more than anything in life. I truly believe it's one of the most serious maladies of our times. But this guy knows how to shoot movies better than any other human being, so what can I say? The fact that he seems to avoid the temptation of becoming arrogant about his own success, and that this humility clearly shows on the way he writes his film-making history, it's evidence enough for me that what he has done should be an example for all others venturing in the crazy world of cinema.
I also believe cinema and art as a whole should always be a tool to raise social awareness, so those who think "cinema is entertainment" should not even have started reading my review. For this very same reason I tend to give higher ratings to documentaries in general, as opposed to fictional feature movies - although biopics and history movies also take advantage of my bias, to the extent that they provide an accurate portrait of reality.
The other three Gondry movies I've given a 10-star rating: "Eternal Sunshine...", "La science des rêves" and "Be Kind Rewind" - they all share this same verisimilitude quality, even though they are all science-fiction. I suppose it doesn't have to be real, to feel real.
Besides these qualities aforementioned, a 10-star movie should also be beautifully shot, carry a compelling story, have beautiful music and likable characters. More than anything, they have to make me cry. And they have to make me laugh, and laugh hard. They need to be able to make me realize how beautiful the world we live in is. But they also cannot ever try to make me forget all the terrible things that we do to each other.
They need to remind me how fragile is peace and harmony in the world, they should bring about a sober recognition of the challenges we face, and the defeats we've suffered in the past. But they should not be apocalyptic or defeatist (looking at you, Ridley Scott). We're still alive, and that's the good news, always. Aliens don't always have to invade Earth, conflict for conflict's sake does not a good movie make.
It might sound crazy that a movie about a block party in Brooklyn could elicit so many feelings in one person sitting on the other side of the planet... I've watched it twice, separated by a good number of years, to make sure that it does. And it does, and I still love every minute of it, down to the very last second of soundtrack on the credits. Bare in mind that I'm not even a huge hip-hop fan, but this isn't about a music genre - it's about people like me, like all of us.
Nobody in the world could have done it so beautifully, so gently, so unpretentiously. Nobody but Dave Chappelle could make me lose my breath laughing, and keep a smile on my face for almost two hours. Nobody in the world would have been able to capture the beauty of this reality, without putting his own ego on the way, but Michel Gondry - not unlike what he did on the very good "The We and the I", though here on "Block Party" once again he has achieved perfection. And he did so once again by not getting in the way of a beautiful story waiting to be told. His eyes are our eyes, the eyes of curious people not looking for a lecture, but eager to be allowed in different worlds, and to be accepted therein.
Watch this, then join me on waiting for whatever the folks involved on this movie come up with next. They're talented and they appreciate the beauty that exists in this world, and we badly need it now that the dark times are back.
