Idea: Mr. Fletcher (Danny Glover) goes on vacation and leaves Mike (Mos Def) in charge of the video store. After Jerry (Jack Black) accidentally erases all the tapes, Mike and Jerry improvise their own versions of the movies back on to the tapes with Alma's (Melonie Diaz) help.I complain a lot about ambiguity in movies for a reason. When something doesn't make sense, is incomplete, or is dropped altogether, it takes away from the rest of the movie. You're left wondering what happened to that character or subplot instead of paying attention to what's on screen, and your experience with movie is diminished.
Movies can and do use ambiguity to their advantage, though. Pineapple Express jettisoned an entire subplot about Dale's girlfriend's family in favour of one crazy scene, and it streamlined the film. Before Sunrise ended ambiguously, and that ending was its biggest, most romantic gift to the audience: for nine years, it was up to you if they met up. Great fiction lets you decide for yourself, and the ambiguity in writer-director Michel Gondry's lovely feature does that with pretty much every scene: Is Mike Mr. Fletcher's son? Are Mr. Fletcher and Miss Falewicz (a delightfully loopy Mia Farrow) in love? What's Jerry's deal? Gondry will never tell!
Instead, the ambiguity enhances the feeling that you just dropped into the slightly off-kilter lives of the residents of Passaic, NJ and the employees/hangers-on of Be Kind Rewind, a store with one dollar video rentals. It makes up for other flaws in the movie's plotting and pacing, so the enterprise seems sweet and exciting. It's not your average underdog story -- no one seems to win against the man, ever. As an ode to the fun that we make for ourselves, it's a bubbly diversion, visually stimulating (there's a hilarious, near-throw away moment involving painted coveralls and a "ladder gang") with heart to spare. If it inspires you to start sweding your own videos, so much the better. B+
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