The Plot: In this docudrama, award-winning musician Pharrell Williams narrates his life story. From humble origins in Virginia Beach far from the music industry to being scouted and found through his school band The Neptunes. Then onwards to musical success and an ever-expanding number of other roles including fashion designer and entrepreneur, gaining the respect of his peers including Gwen Stefani, Justin Timberlake and Snoop Dogg. The twist here is that his story is related entirely through the medium of Lego animation…
The Verdict: Documentaries about the hard-knock life of a musician trying to get by in the industry are plentiful. It’s an industry that can praise and acclaim new talent, but then just as soon chew them up and spit them out when their mojo isn’t firing on all cylinders. Just ask Pharrell Williams whose rise, fall and rise again is a story of persistence and a belief in that laudable American concept of everyone deserving a second chance. Whenever a chance comes it should be grabbed with both hands… or in the case of Piece Of Piece with both Lego hands. For this is no ordinary documentary, as Williams has convinced director Morgan Neville to relate his story through Lego animation so that it takes on another dimension. Somehow, it mostly works and that’s because it comes across as a natural fit for Williams’ idiosyncratic view of his career, his personal life and the world around him. After all, he describes himself as an odd child here.
Neville has made similarly poignant documentaries about singular personalities like Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, so moving to Lego animation is an interesting way to switch it up. It’s more than just a case of Neville indulging Williams’ quirky personality. There’s a novelty aspect to relating a real-life story of success, fame and failure through a different medium. That’s for about the first ten minutes, but once the film’s style settles down and the agenda becomes clear then it moves beyond the novelty to embrace a talented multi-hyphenate who dreamed big and aimed bigger as a result. Neville has assembled an interesting number of sources: from recent interviews with other musicians to older ones (in standard definition in the latter); from archive footage to re-enactments so that it takes on a docudrama aspect; from music videos to imaginative flights of fancy. He then ‘brickifies’ all that and to make it more family-friendly given the medium, he then amusingly spreads around some ‘PG spray’ which Williams nearly gets high on at one point (ha-ha). It’s enough to say that parents will get more out of this animated film than their children.
It’s something of an odd beast that doesn’t entirely gel together. There’s some fairly sobering stuff about Williams reaching a low point and trying to find his way back, which he did eventually with the earworm song Happy. It’s at a point like that when seeing the real Williams and not a mostly inexpressive piece of CGI plastic would benefit the film for a fourth-wall-breaking moment (something that previous Lego movies have done before). The handmade-like aspect of the animation can sometimes stand in the way of reaching deeper meaning. However, it also has the benefit of tapping into Williams’ dreamer instincts and depicting him in space and other environments that might be rendered through more traditional animation. Whatever one thinks of the approach taken in Piece By Piece, there’s no denying that it’s full of heart and soul with some toe-tapping tunes and a positive message about firm self-belief. Music fans and Lego fans should be Happy enough to engage with it and the amusing Snoop Dogg scenes are worth the admission price alone. Good fun but informative too.
Rating: 3 / 5
Review by Gareth O’Connor
