KO Film Review of Teenage Paparazzo
Today was the screening and Q&A for the Adrian Grenier directed, HBO documentary of Teenage Paparazzo at the Glenbow Museum in Calgary. Adrian Grenier and his co-producer Evan Ferrante were in attendance and participated in the Q&A period after the screening. I had downloaded the film on iTunes and watched it for the first time about a month ago to analyze it. I wanted to have my questions ready and I wanted to have ample time to digest the film ahead of time. I have to say, before I get into my take on the film, that I am very impressed that a celebrity as big as Grenier, actually took the time to bring this film to Calgary and genuinely appeared to care for the integrity of his film. I found him to be very sincere sitting through the questions of fans, press and film buffs alike. It gave me a new appreciation for this film and for him as an Actor/Director.
In a film history class a couple of years ago, my Prof at the time, Dr. Charles Tepperman, discussed how difficult it is this day in age to bring audiences into the theater because of all the other devices (handheld and otherwise) in which people can view films on. Hence the reason why James Cameron was concerned with inventing this new technology used in Avatar 3-D viewing (the Real 3-D, Dolby 3-D, XpanD 3-D, and IMAX 3-D formats, and 4-D viewing) so the only way to be able to see this film would be to buy an expensive ticket and go to the theater to watch it. I thought about this in reference to what Grenier is trying to do with this Teenage Paparazzo Documentary. Traditionally, documentary film making is mostly concerned with dialogue, facts and discoveries, and would not be very exciting to watch on either 3-D or the big screen in the Theater. However, if you can replicate these Boutique style Film Festival experiences (that have rapidly grown increasingly popular in the past 20 years and have been for a very elite audience), and grow them to a larger audience, include a director or actor to offer a Q& A after the screening, this may very well be the answer to the dilemma of bringing wider audiences in the theater to see documentary films that traditionally are not in wide release.
The largest question this film raises is, when Film vs. Fame is concerned, where does fictional life cross over reality? Documentary in general these days, is written, scripted, and precisely contrived in such a biased way that it is rarely ever reminiscent of the Cinéma vérité that once existed in years past. I don’t think this film was an exception. Story wise, I am sure Austin Visschedyk owns a camera and actually takes candid pics of celebs, but…c’mon, this kids is an Actor. Not a paparazzo. Austin’s photog web domain on go daddy, www.austinseye.com expired on June 2, 2011, so how serious can this kid be about his career or profession as it were? How could any mother in her right mind allow her 13 year old son to be on the Sunset Strip in Hollywood until all hours of the early morning with pepper spray as his only defence? It just doesn’t seem that believable. What bothered me the very most about this film was that Austin looks like a body double for Justin Bieber circa 2009 from the hair, to the purple hoodie, to the obnoxious mannerisms to his unripened pubescent voice. The follow up towards the end, which showed how Austin matured, even showed more similarities to the updated Bieber. For me, this similarity seemed to reflect the strive for fame, and I am sure this Austin kids gets recognized more for looking like Bieber, than he does for this film. It was very difficult for me to get past this similarity and look deeper into the character of Austin as a paparazzo, and not just a child desperate for fame in Los Angeles like millions of other little boys who replicate Bieber’s style, without striving to be different or an individual. I just didn’t find it particularly fresh. That being said, I applaud Grenier as well as the people who brought him and the film to Calgary, the experience was very worth while and although the film didn’t make me think as much as Errol Morris‘ documentaries do, Grenier is easy on the eyes.
