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Heading into Sunday's Academy Awards, "Exit Through the Gift Shop" is undoubtedly the most buzzed-about film in the documentary feature category. But the uncomfortable question persists: Is it real?
The movie is anchored by two of the least reliable narrators in memory: Banksy, the anonymous British street artist; and Thierry Guetta, an eccentric French emigre to Los Angeles whose obsessive filming happens to capture the world of high-concept graffiti. In alternating interviews, the two recount the rise of anti-establishment vandals into the upper echelons of the art world, where their work quickly became commodified.
The twist comes with Guetta's transformation from the movement's accidental video scribe into Mr. Brainwash, a street artist phenomenon whose 2008 coming-out party in Los Angeles made him an instant -- if completely derivative -- success, and whose art now sells in the six figures.
The camera captures it all, sparking speculation about the film's veracity: Did the clever Banksy -- the film's credited director -- create Guetta to mock the art world? Is Guetta -- who shot much of the footage -- actually a paid actor playing a savant-like character invented for the project? Or, as some have speculated, is he Banksy himself?
Banksy has insisted the film is completely true. But coming from an unidentifiable artist whose work includes titles such as "I can't believe you morons actually buy this ...," such claims have only fueled the doubts.
Guetta himself, speaking to The Times in his first extended interview since the film was released last spring, said, "This movie is 100% real."
Over cigarettes and McDonald's fries at his studio on La Brea Avenue last week, Guetta recounted his path from a rough Parisian suburb to California, where he repeatedly reinvented himself -- going from teenage nightclub impresario to clothing store owner, filmmaker and, ultimately, pop artist. If there was one constant, it was Guetta's uncanny knack for selling Angelenos the cutting edge of cool.
The details of Guetta's unlikely biography are broadly supported by a review of public records, which trace his life in Los Angeles from his arrival as a teenager in the early 1980s. They are also consistent with the accounts of friends, former business associates and employees over those years.
Of course, it is impossible...