'Lego Brickumentary': Building a case for world domination
According to A Lego Brickumentary, Kief Davidson and Daniel Junge's actively appreciative documentary about the interlocking plastic bricks from Denmark, more than enough Legos have found their way into children's playrooms and grown-ups' work stations that there are now "over one hundred Lego pieces for every person on the planet."
According to A Lego Brickumentary, Kief Davidson and Daniel Junge's actively appreciative documentary about the interlocking plastic bricks from Denmark, more than enough Legos have found their way into children's playrooms and grown-ups' work stations that there are now "over one hundred Lego pieces for every person on the planet."
Not that they are equally distributed. Nathan Sawaya, a lawyer who quit his job to make Lego art, has the pieces delivered to his studio by the truckload. Alice Finch, a Seattle mom turned AFOL (Adult Fan of Lego), recreated the entire Hogwarts School and grounds using 400,000 Lego pieces. Her lovingly rendered Lego model of Rivendell, the elven fiefdom of The Lord of the Rings, was modest by comparison - made with a mere 200,000 pieces.
Although it often feels like a company-bankrolled promo film, A Lego Brickumentary answers all the questions both Lego novices and Lego nerds would want to know. The company's origins (toymaker Ole Kirk Christiansen bought an injection-molding machine and made his first plastic toy in 1947), the company's innovations ("minifigs" - mini figures that snap and lock into place - were introduced in 1978), the company's themed sets (Batman, Star Wars, Thomas the Tank Engine, etc., etc.), the company's fan culture (Brick Con is like Comic Con, only with more purpose), Lego's use as a teaching tool for kids with autism (in Cherry Hill, at the Y.A.L.E. School), and Lego's role in space exploration (Lego figurines on NASA's Juno mission to Jupiter) . . . check, check, check, check, and check.
Oh, and that mildly successful movie spin-off, The Lego Movie? Its existence is acknowledged.
A Lego Brickumentary
reveals an enlightened corporate culture, with its design managers and "master builders" at its Billund headquarters encouraged to work on new concepts, embrace new ideas - even if they come from amateur aficionados.
Narrated by Jason Bateman (in the guise of an animated minifig), A Lego Brickumentary is not a film for everyone. Only the half-billion people - a statistic cited in the film - who have spent hours building skyscrapers and cars, bridges and castles, spaceships and jet planes out of the colorful studs-and-tubes construction toys will have even the slightest interest in the movie.
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