Michel Gondry: Do It Yourself

This is an engaging, relatively fluffy documentary about French filmmaker, Michel Gondry, directed by his regular assistant, François Nemeta. As such, it comes across as a bit of a fawning love letter to a genius. This may sound like damning with faint praise but it's a pretty infectious watch, mainly due to Gondry's sheer likeability. I can't imagine this bloke angry, and it's almost a twist when he marginally raises his voice in one section where he's directing a scene from Mood Indigo.

Gondry started his arts career as a drummer in the band Oui Oui, where he made the music videos to accompany their songs. Soon enough, his talent for filmmaking outshone his drumming and he moved on to create clips for other musicians, including Thomas Dolby, Inspiral Carpets, Lenny Kravitz and Terence Trent D'Arby. But it was his association with Björk that propelled him towards stardom, making eight music vids with her, notably Army of Me and Human Behaviour. He was much sought after and moved on to collaborations with the likes of The Chemical Brothers, Massive Attack, Beck, Radiohead, Kylie Minogue, The White Stripes and, famously, Daft Punk, for their Around the World clip in 1997.

He might have kept making only these quirkily brilliant short musical films, if it weren't for a clip of Björk's that was screened in a cinema in London. This (and maybe his friendly rivalry with fellow film clip maker turned feature director, Spike Jonze) gave him the idea to try his hand at making features. An odd debut, Human Nature in 2001, was followed by more music videos, and then his feature masterpiece thus far, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004). 

Gondry seems to do about eight music vids for every one feature and he also found time to open his Amateur Film Factories, a kind of hands-on film course for anyone, around the world. Near the end of the film we see him and Nemata visit the Michel Gondry College, just south of Paris, which he false-brags to Jonze about in an earlier interview. 

The interviews are short and sweet for the most part - notable folk include Minogue, Jack Black, Jack White, Tom Rowlands (of The Chemical Brothers), plus old footage of Kate Winslet and Jim Carrey, as well as more personal chats with Gondry's brothers, François and Olivier. These are interspersed with behind-the-scenes clips of Gondry at work and lots of his imaginative output, especially from his music videos, where I reckon he excels.

Michel Gondry: Do It Yourself is a gentle essay on the workings of a modern day Méliès. It's screening as part of the Sydney Underground Film Festival from Sep 12-15 at the Dendy Newtown.

See also:

Gondry's Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) is a near perfect romantic drama. My pick of his clips would have to be: The Chemical Brothers' Let Forever Be (1999), Massive Attack's Protection (1995), Kylie Minogue's Come Into My World (2002), Daft Punk's Around the World (1997) and Björk's Army of Me (1995). Oh, and he also did an episode of Flight of the Conchords. Present.