A quick google search on Russell Brand comes up with a litany of adjectives describing his personality: notorious, vulgar, deep, irritating, egotistical, megalomaniacal, intelligent, confused, articulate, self-absorbed, clever, obnoxious, dynamic, arrogant, magnetic, narcissistic, outspoken. Brand is an amped-up personality that almost exists in its own hyperbolic reality. Naturally, an amped-up personality creates hyperbolic reactions that repels as strongly as it attracts.
Wherever you land on Russell Brand as a personality, BRAND: A Second Coming will only reinforce your opinion. With this new profile-as-documentary, Ondi Timoner (Dig!, We Live In Public) has created a film that embodies Brand’s seemingly warts-and-all personality. She captures the nuance of an extreme personality but never fully succeeds at penetrating the presentation.
BRAND: A Second Coming opens with Jeremy Paxman laughing off the “stupid” question asking if Russell Brand is a messiah. The following 2 hours spends its time building the case that Brand, because of the life he has lived, knows the questions that need to be asked to save society…and may even know some of the answers.
Make no mistake, this is not a complete hagiography. Timoner presents Brand with all his flaws. A man born into poverty to become a multi-millionaire celebrity, a former drug addict, a former sex addict, a firebrand and a loudmouth, Timoner makes the case that Brand’s search for happiness through the various strata of society is precisely what makes him the one-eyed man in the kingdom of the blind.
When I say that Timoner makes the case, I really should say that Brand makes the case. As much as Timoner is the director, Brand seems to be in full control of this revealing look, emphasizing much of what he has already revealed in his various comedy tours (specifically Messiah Complex), and his book Revolution. While the film draws his rise to fame, it all is adding up to his emergence as a socio-political commentator with his various interviews, The Trews, and Revolution. For all the chaos that Brand creates with his personality, this presentation seems tightly controlled through both editing and content.
This tightly controlled documentary almost reminds me of Madonna: Truth or Dare, the gold star example of a celebrity pushing an image and a political agenda through a tightly controlled presentation. Madonna’s film revealed a woman who was down with the gays, openly and unapologetically sexual, and blatantly anti-authoritarian. She purported to be revealing all in frank and spontaneous conversations. And, she pushed a 3rd wave feminist political agenda where women can be open about who they are.
Similarly, Brand’s film reveals him as a man who is down with the gays, openly and unapologetically sexual, blatantly anti-authoritarian. He reveals a questionable past through his comedy tours, frank interviews, and voiceovers. And, he is pushing his anti-capitalist anti-establishment political agenda. In addition, both films capture a perfect snapshot of a persona at the moment, but fail to plumb the why.
Towards the end of BRAND: A Second Coming, Timoner includes a brief interview in a van. She tells Brand that she thinks he thinks he’s better than everybody else, but then states that she thinks he’s certainly more intelligent than most people. He counters that he thinks that’s what she thinks, and it doesn’t mean it’s what he thinks. Reminiscent of Madonna’s “bed” scenes with her dancers, this conversation displays just how much control Brand has, or wants to have, over his image.
Similarly, while not a hagiography, this is far from a character assassination piece. Every bit of the “warts and all” ugliness is relatively forgivable. Even interviews with his “first girlfriend” present a personality that was forgivably flawed and has been striving to right his wrongs. None of the flaws are seen as fatal, and most are seen as hurdles to be overcome so Brand could arrive at his current stage of enlightenment.
Though this seems to be an impossible balancing act, Timoner’s film is as delightful as it is confrontational. Much like Brand himself, BRAND: A Second Coming is fast, funny, intelligent, and prescient. It’s very much a product of our times, both in its cult of personality and its simultaneous rejection of the fame monster. Complicated and contradictory, the one thing that you can’t say about BRAND: A Second Coming is that its boring.