Brock Enright & Kirsten Dierup – Torben LP/Brock Enright: Good Times Will Never Be the Same LP/DVD (Factory 25)
The gatefold LP/DVD enchilada in which Factory 25 delivers Jody Lee Lipes’ documentary is an idealistic future vision in packaging that may end up as little more than a hopeful gesture. Two thumbs and two toes up re: the packaging, even if it does include a congestion of blurb hype on the back cover. Now, upon first digestion, I had to beat back impulses to map out how Brock Enright: Good Times Will Never Be the Same reminded me why the contemporary, art-school idea of “the artist” (or the artist’s idea of himself/herself) meshes perfectly with this era of underwhelming-to-whelming returns. The following bit of dialogue is an unwittingly telling one: “But I’m the girlfriend, and I’m the one that’s going to have to explain to our roommates the reason why we don’t have our part of the rent when we get back. I know you don’t think about that, but I do…I think about it.”
I suppose a brief synopsis is in order, lest everything I write fail to make further sense. Brock Enright is an artist in what appears to be his mid-to-late 20s. Unexpectedly, he’s a pretty likeable, self-effacing guy with the pretention level dialed down to “stomachable,” which, relative to his demographic, will be way too pretentious for a lot of potential viewers. Lipes documents Enright and his longtime (long-suffering) girlfriend, Kirsten Dierup, as they travel across the country to her family’s cabin in the Redwood forest outside of Mendocina, CA. The cabin is the destination where Brock is to work on an installment commissioned by Perry Rubenstein Gallery in NYC – his first solo show in the city.
The film starts out as a visual look at the most boring road trip ever, with night after night staying and filming in built-yesterday, pre-fab comfort-cubes presumably owned by Middle Easterners. This makes sense, in a way, as off-the-beaten path motels with personality can lead to scary road situations for robbery-inviting parties like this one. Before long, this backdrop is livened up with uncomfortable Misunderstood Artist vs. Responsible-Therefore-Embattled Girlfriend drama. Then we’re at the cabin, where Dierup’s family steps in as the source of discomfort for the participants, and later, the viewer. Hard to watch.
Enright lacks almost everything that makes today’s version of a visual artist such an insufferable personality. He is not a quasi-intellectual. He is not an asshole. He could be struggling at any form, be it writing, music, or what-have-you, and the basic conflicts would be the same, namely in terms of his relationship with Dierup, who with a very gendered brush, paints her own work of jealousy over his work. Throw her passive-aggressive (disguised as laid-back) family (dad, mom, and fireman brother) into the mix, and viewers might have to stop every five minutes for a breather.
All in all, this movie was a pleasant surprise, but not a pleasant watch. The LP that provides the soundtrack was a surprise as well. Composed by Enright and Dierup (it would be interesting to know WHEN it was composed … relative to the filming), it shows the former to be an occasional genius in the songwriting dept. It’s very contemporary and shows up Animal Collective big-time in the context of memorable one-man psych weirdness, though the omnipresent influence predictable. Each of the two core participants has a respective side, and I gotta say, Enright’s shames his little lady, erasing her sonic diddle-daddle with real talent. Top to bottom, this is a fairly fascinating project that’s worth SOME of the hype. (http://www.factorytwentyfive.com)
(Andrew Earles)
