The best thing, worst thing, and main thing about the new Bieber Doc “Justin Bieber: Believe” in about the time it takes to watch the trailer. Don’t forget to take a shot at the “Best Ever” challenge in the comments!
REVIEW TEXT:
So does this mean we can expect a new Bieber movie every year? I sounded way to excited about that, didn’t I?
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“Justin Bieber’s Believe” is the 2nd documentary about the pop star and he’s meteoric rise to fame. This one follows up Never Say Never by taking us inside the preparation and execution of the new album and tour. I found the first one insightful, entertaining, and even touching. This one? Well, not so much.
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Now don’t get me wrong, I’m still rooting for the kid. Music aside, I think it’s unfair the way our culture picks out punching bags often times just because they are popular or successful. I find Justin Bieber jokes to be as annoying and cheap as the Britney Spears jokes were before him and the Michael Jackson jokes were before that. I know that’s not necessarily part of what might make the movie good or bad, but I wanted to mention it because I think the easy thing to do in talking about a movie like this is to rip into it just because Bieber and his saggy pants make such a fun punching bag. So let’s talk about the actual movie, you know what I liked about this one? and let’s call it the best thing, they actually address those issues in here. Not nearly enough I think, but there is a pretty great scene towards the end of the film where Justin is directly asked what will keep him from going off the deep end when there is nobody around him to tell him no. I didn’t necessarily find his answer compelling, but still it’s nice to hear someone ask. And in case you’re curious, The Beebs also gives an answer as to why he wears his pants so low, turns out it’s because he’s trying to “wear the pants” and not let “the pants wear him”. Kids a true philosopher I tell ya’. Point being it was a good conversation and reminded me why I liked the first documentary so much.
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But it was only one scene, and for the rest of the movie, it just plays like one big commercial for the album and tour. And I guess we should know that going in, but they did such a great job telling his story in the first one I guess I expected a little more of that in this one as well. Plus there have been a slew of great music docs in the past couple years that I thought they would have the formula down. Plus, and this might just be a personal thing, but I’m calling it my worst thing anyway, I found the actual concert footage to be so over the top and ridiculous that it bordered on parody.
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All in All, Believe is a disappointing follow up film to the far superior Never Say Never. Though there are a few scattered moments of apparently honesty and introspection, the vast majority of it feels forced and silly. I give it a C-
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