‘Flipside’ review: Judd Apatow, Starlee Kine, and David Milch talk art and failure

For film festival veterans, there are many red flags in the plot description for Flipside. 

1st off, it is a documentary in which its director turns the camera on himself, a move that can lead to a rivetingly vulnerable exploration of self, but which extra typically final results in ruthlessly self-indulgent navel-gazing. Second, documentarian Christopher Wilcha is seeking back at his previous from the precipice of a mid-life crisis, a beginning point ripe for wallowing. Third, his pal and collaborator in this work is Judd Apatow, a modern comedy titan who is also identified for beleaguering runtimes and sentimental excesses. And however, for all the prospective pitfalls that could pitch this image into an abyss of groaning solipsism, Flipside deftly leaps more than each and every one particular, landing on anything funny, believed-provoking, and sublime.  

Remarkably, Wilcha starts with a tone that may set extra jaded viewers on edge, a true danger taking into consideration his essential demographic will most likely be fellow angst-ridden Gen X-ers. But he thoughtfully broadens concentrate, connecting his story of artistic ambition, capitalist compromise, and worry of mortality to other artists and creatives — like an eccentric Television character and the Television legend David Milch (Deadwood, NYPD Blue). With each other, they kind a patchwork that invites the audience to reflect on their personal lives, as properly as the comfort that we’re not alone.

Watch out, even though. If you are not second-guessing your possibilities currently, you may be when Flipside is by way of with you. 

What is Flipside about? 

Named for the New Jersey record shop that Wilcha worked at as a teen, Flipside is many stories all at when. The initially is about Wilcha, who was a filmmaker on the rise 20 years ago, thanks to his difficult documentary The Target Shoots 1st. There, he’d produced a mockery of his survival job at Columbia Property to criticize the stodgy capitalism of his parents’ generation. This was a time when becoming a “sellout” was a cultural crime, even though rent comes dues what ever your principles.

More than the years, Wilcha produced extra documentaries, teaming with Ira Glass for This American Life‘s Television show (which won him a Primetime Emmy in 2008) and shooting a behind-the-scenes specific for Apatow’s flop Funny Individuals. On the other hand, his side hustle started to spend off, pushing off his passion projects to be forgotten on a shelf of dust-covered really hard drives. And prior to he knew it, he was no longer the “damn the man” documentarian, he was a industrial director who feared he’d develop into what he when most loathed — reality bites, certainly.

Inside Flipside, Wilcha confronts his failures in not finishing these films by bringing their footage into this one particular. At initially, their inclusion appears nearly masochistic, as he reveals beautiful interviews and patient, evocative footage, all of it urging us to consider what may have been. Then, it appears these forgotten projects will be the fuel to finish the one particular about the titular record shop, its owner an aging connoisseur whose hoarder aesthetic and jerky-smelling shop does not connect to the modern day vinyl collector. But as Wilcha weaves from one particular story to a different, mirroring his prior project-hopping, he ties seemingly disparate stories collectively into a widespread bring about

Flipside is a story of failure and forgiveness. 

A group of individuals pose for a selfie.
Credit: Oscilloscope Laboratories

A single such project was a documentary about a storied jazz photographer. A further intended to adhere to radio producer/podcast luminary Starlee Kine as she confronted writer’s block whilst drafting a book. Shot more than decades, these untold hours of footage have fresh which means, even if the photog has passed and Kine’s book was by no means published. They all speak to the challenges of an artistic vocation. What drives you? What scares you? What stops you from pursuing the dream project you so badly wanted? 

When this may sound like an subject wealthy in self-loathing, Wilcha is romantic in his regard for just about every element of the messiness that is creation. He connects to these artists’ struggles working with close-up shots as his interviewees spill their secrets reflect how close he got to them and how close he nevertheless feels to them. We’re invited in to metaphorically share the exact same air, fraught with panic and possibility. Like his subjects, his plotting zigs back and forth, reflecting on a previous now nostalgic and sweet, musing on a present that feels not possible to hang onto, and fretting more than a future we can’t genuinely predict. And inside all this, Wilcha finds humor and humanity — which may be no surprise to fans of This American Life. 

Ira Glass speaks into a microphone.
Credit: Oscilloscope Laboratories

Probably the funniest moment is when Judd Apatow requires a FaceTime contact from Wilcha’s mother, who unleashes on him for becoming the purpose her son moved her grandchildren across the nation to Los Angeles. It is an alarmingly intimate moment, and Mrs. Wilcha does not hold back, not for the sake of civility or her son’s camera. Apatow requires the blows like a prize fighter, but there is a genuine sadness from each and every as they recognize what potent consequences can come from deceptively easy choices. 

Right here is the heart of Flipside. Wilcha examines not only his personal life and foibles but also these who’ve entrusted him with their stories. In these tapes, he has discovered moments of loss, grace, bitterness, and tenderness. He does not center the story on himself, but he does expose his personal subjectivity. Interviews are not shot in stark rooms with staunch wide shots. These individuals curl up on their couches, crash onto battered workplace chairs, or lean on a box of raggedy record sleeves. There is no feigned distance among him and his subjects, since they are connected. And by way of Wilcha’s gently persistent narration, we are guided by way of just about every interaction. His tone is extra familiar than that of a tour guide, even though, and we’re not just the audience but also fellow passengers on this voyage. 

Flipside is about extra than one particular individual or one particular record shop. It is about the quest to locate goal in art and vocation. But extra than that, this completed film is about forgiving your self for issues not operating out as you planned and creating peace with the present by building anything new with the pieces of previous failings. It is attractive and inspiring, and it may just spur you into some thoughts-fucking self-reflection. Great luck.

Flipside is now playing in theaters.

UPDATE: May perhaps. 30, 2024, two:51 p.m. EDT Flipside was reviewed out of its Planet Premiere at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival. This write-up has been republished for its theatrical release.