Katie Jurek Watching a guy who's obsessed with filming (badly) become famous in his own right has never been so maddeningly stupefying. The descriptions Banksy and other street artists give of "Mr. Brainwash" are so incredibly comical that I could recommend this movie even if only for those alone.

Rusty and the Argonauts Coming from Banksy's home city, you can't miss a screening of anything 'him' related. If art in general is subjective, then the question of whether or not somebody is, or not a worthy artist is clearly down to what an artist provokes within. My personal view of the outcome was that the film itself and the string pulling the whole illusion was maybe the art and not the exhibition, either way .... Is this a touch of the Emperor's New clothes? Or is there really such a fine line between genius and insanity?

SnoopyStyle Banksy directs a documentary about Thierry Guetta who immigrated from France in 1999. He opened a trendy vintage clothing shop in L.A. He is constantly filming with his video camera. He discovers his cousin is street artist Space Invader which turns into a more in-depth obsession with other street artists. Invader connects him with Shepard Fairey which leads to other artists. He gets intrigued with the secretive Banksy. He films Banksy and then Banksy turns the camera on him.There is a fun energy about this. It feels guerrilla secretive outsider work. Then the question becomes whether this is real or fake or semi-real. It colors the movie for me. In the end, this is another form of street art. It doesn't have to follow any demands of a documentary. I took the whole movie with a grain of salt. It doesn't mean it's bad. I just wish this is a more definitive solid movie about Banksy.

Semisonic Are the things around you real? Are they really what they seem? These questions are not entirely new, and usually the movies that pretend to answer them feature people in leather and latex and bullet dodging. But can you recall a single documentary that makes you ask the same questions without even actually trying to do it? I certainly don't. And this is just one of the things that Exit Through the Gift Shop does in a fresh and innovative way.It's actually hard to describe what this film is without being either banal or cryptic. On the surface, this is a documentary about street art, people who do it and a particular person with a camera, who started as just a spectator from aside and ended up an overnight sensation in the art world himself.But again, that's just the surface, and is everything what it seems? May it be a contrived attempt to show the true nature of modern art, a brilliant satire about the "true" value of it and a clear demonstration that in today's postmodernist world the only things that matter are promotion and hype?Anyway, no matter if this film is a true chronicle of the street art and the people who make it or some sort of mockumentary prank made by Banksy to promote himself or have a laugh at the whole world for our own money, it's still a very thought provoking film and a great opportunity to see street art beyond simple graffiti. At least i finally got to see some of Banksy's works, and i have to admit that what he and some other guys do is far from plain vandalism authorities try to make it look like.Still, Exit Through the Gift Shop is about more than just the counterculture art. It's also about the contemporary art as a whole, about the way it's perceived by people and what makes the difference between art and kitschy rubbish. This topic had already been raised before, but what makes this film unique is that it's not a fiction, and those guys who took some retard's sick fantasies at face value were not hired actors but regular people. And no matter if Banksy is an authentic artist or a project aimed at monetary gain, it takes a degree of brilliance to show so clearly in what screwed up world we're living today.