A Lego Brickumentary

Confession: I am documentary junkie. That said, this film was not exactly a work of art. It has the feeling of an IMAX or theme park film, but don't let that stop you.

The story of Lego is reminiscent of many titans of business; big ideas growing out of a small shop, and so forth. What this movie is really about though is summed up in this statement: "99% of the smartest people in the world do not work for us." Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen explains as he recounts the near death experience of Lego in the early 2000's.

Clearly Lego is *capitalizing on their success. As such, this movie shows how great of a company Lego is; and to be honest, Lego seems to deserving of all the attention it has been getting.

But this "Brickumentary" is more than that. It is also a window into the immensely diverse world of Lego fanboys and girls, (think Bronys,Trekkies, et.al.), and lets us in to the way Lego utilizes "crowd-sourcing", something Lego appears to have been on the cutting edge of. It shows us how Lego has become a medium for the arts, a tool of scientific inquiry, and how little kids who started with a box of plastic bricks were later inspired to engineering things that have helped us in the real world.

My family loved it. Looking forward to watching it again soon.

(PS: my only complaint is that there is a split second or two of non-kid friendly content. Surely the filmmakers knew that their audience would predominantly be children. Some things are better left unsaid or in this case, un-shown...)

A Lego Brickumentary (2014)

*** (out of 4)

Jason Bateman narrates this somewhat long-winded by highly informative documentary about the history of LEGOs and why everyone loves them so much. The documentary covers how the company got started, the early troubles with fire and then goes into detail about how the company evolved over the decades to become a global phenomenon. We get interviews with fans, master builders as well as people who have a dream job of creating new models.

If you're a fan of LEGOs then you'll certainly love this film as it really does tell you everything you need to know about the company and its fans. The documentary does a very good job with the history but it also gives you a good idea of what they plan on doing in the future including how they got fans involved with what they come up with . We get to see some of the amazing large creations that superfans have come up with as well as some of the fan-made movies.

"LEGO toys build anything. Especially pride." LEGO

A LEGO Brickumentary is a memorable documentary about one of the world's most successful businesses devoted to only one toy, but perhaps the most creative toy ever devised. Although the doc could be considered an extended ad for the little building blocks, and in a way it is whether the filmmakers mean it or not, the film is a colorful—in all senses of the word—history. Its founders and artists are more creative and enthusiastic, I suspect, than even lucky Google employees.

Or maybe even eccentric: the founder, Ole Kirk Christiansen, kept building new factories after at least three in a row burned down, the first one the original LEGO factory in Denmark. That joyful determination pervades the enterprise, where artists and scientists collaborate (Lego is a model of creativity sharing) like brainy kids given their first Gilbert chemistry sets.

If one doesn't work for LEGO, it doesn't mean you aren't invested in the product: Brickartist Nathan Sawaya in Manhattan claims to spend more than $100,000 a year on the bricks. His full-size human and animal LEGO artworks show his investment and enthusiasm as well as mesmerizing subjects.

It's worth seeing if only for the grand creations such as a full-sized plane and a village so beautifully appointed you'll want to shrink just to live there. If I sound rhapsodic, then so be it, for I am good with following the instructions when my grandson Toby and I put a themed model together. I leave digging out old bricks to create something unique to Toby.

If you loved The Lego Movie, this doc will show you the models used in that lovable film, and if you wonder what AFOLS is (Adult Fans of LEGO), or if you're curious how LEGOs are used in therapy, then sit back and relax with this unusual Brickumentary.

Parade of the Virgins! That's what I thought when I saw that "A Lego Brickumentary" (G, 1:33) focused mainly on adult Lego enthusiasts. Then I saw married couples and families in this documentary… so I couldn't use that particular line. Next I thought that I could just mock the adults whose main hobby was building with Legos as being simply uncool. That's when I saw award-winning singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran, "South Park" co-creator Trey Parker and Houston Rockets star Dwight Howard all extol the virtues of the plastic bricks. At that point… well, I was kinda led to take this documentary a little more seriously. And that was only the beginning.

The movie does begin at the beginning, explaining how Lego bricks were invented and became one of Denmark's most famous exports, but who knew that so many adults took those colorful little bricks so seriously? Jason Bateman narrates the documentary which spends most of its time introducing us to adults who have made Lego a way of life, and showing us many, many different uses for this construction "toy".

After we meet Lego "master builders" who are full-time employees of the company, the film introduces us to ordinary people in different countries who became self-made Lego innovators, some of whom have been welcomed into the Lego corporate family. There are also clubs and conventions for those who refer to themselves by the unfortunate-sounding acronym AFOL (Adult Fan of Lego).

Then things get serious. The documentary shows us how Legos have been used in modern art and to build a full-sized replica of a Star Wars X-Wing Fighter. Legos have even been used in city planning and in therapy for autistic children. Throughout the movie, an animated Lego minifigure ("min-fig" for short) pops up to provide moviegoers with explanations of the movie's main points, but mostly, this film is about the people, the surprising variety of people all over the world using Lego bricks in a surprising variety of ways.

"A Lego Brickumentary" follows several of these Lego-centered stories and brings some of them to interesting and satisfying conclusions. The movie was more interesting and wide-ranging than I thought it would be, but it was still not much more than a Lego commercial on steroids. The documentary is fun, but it plays out as a long visitor's center video at the Lego factory or one of the Lego theme parks. "B"

This movie was nothing but dope. As dope as The Lego Movie.

A LEGO Brickumentary explores what seems to be by the documentary standards a history of the invention of Lego, but mostly it goes through how Lego has changed lives since it's invention.

It's a geek culture that I am aware of but sadly I'm not fully a part of, despite my admiration to the product. The filmmakers due an amazing job of impressing me with how far beyond the bricks have come from being just a toy.

It's fitting that the documentary spends a lot of time unavailing a life size X-wing fighter from the movie Star Wars, another product that sparked the same type of geek culture.

But the movie documents how Legos are more awesome than the Star Wars movies (except Star Wars geeks have better nicknames). The documentary showcases how Kids teens and Adults use Legos literally as a tool for the imagination, similar to a pen and a pad (and this is what I love most about the toys). It also shows the growing cult phenomenon that goes outside of the Lego company with people who are able to make a living off of Legos without the company's permission and how Lego encourages this, not something you expect from the #2 biggest toy company in the world.

I feel like Lego does not get enough credit that it deserves, I'm hoping this doc changes that. It has inspired me to pick up the Legos I have.