A hybrid musical-docu-biopic Lego movie like "Piece by Piece" is a rich concept. Presumably, the bright jubilation of "Happy," the chart-topping hit for producer/musician Pharrell Williams, would make his life story a perfect fit for the medium of animation. After all, Williams' playful, genre-bending music (mixing post-soul cool with skater sensibilities) is probably more than a live-action narrative could contain. But in the hands of director Morgan Neville, his life story lacks specificity and substance.
Neville leans on the kind of visual storytelling common to documentary film, his bread and butter, throughout "Piece by Piece." The opening, for instance, borrows the aesthetic language of behind-the-scenes documentaries: A camera follows a Lego Pharrell (voicing himself) from behind as he walks into his home. The singer asks his wife Helen to quiet the kids because he's about to be interviewed. Pharrell and the camera go to a separate room, where two chairs are set up: one for him and another for a Lego version of Neville. The filmmaker then prompts the star to tell his life story—inspiring Pharrell to imagine himself as a baby sea creature swimming through the ocean toward Neptune, the Roman god of the sea. That dream origin pushes us to the shores of Virginia Beach, Pharrell's hometown, where he lives in the Atlantis projects with his mother and father.
From then on, the film takes the usual rise-and-fall-and-rise format typical of music biopics. At his grammar school, Pharrell connects with Pusha T, Missy Elliot, Timbaland, and his eventual Neptunes collaborators Chad Hugo and Shay Haley. The band impresses superstar music producer Teddy Riley, inspiring Williams and Hugo to maximize their creative potential. It leads to collaborations with Gwen Stefani, Jay-Z, Snoop Dogg, Justin Timberlake and more. The plethora of hits, of course, lends the film its jukebox appeal. But visually, Neville, recreates the music videos for "Hollaback Girl" and "Drop It Like It's Hot" as Legos, which is pretty uninspiring. Pharrell's experiences with success then become the primary conflict, as he stretches himself too thin as a hitmaker and as the head of fashion and product lines.
It's all pretty ho-hum. Biopics, especially with the subject's involvement, are always sanitized. Despite the film's love of oft-bleeped expletives, "Piece by Piece" is far too clean. Pharrell's main character flaws in this film add up to, "I'm too trusting" and "I'm afraid of commitment." The former gets him in trouble with A&R men sanding down his musical complexity. The latter occurs in his music, jumping from genre to genre, and in his personal life, with his girlfriend and eventual wife. These aren't uninteresting obstacles. But they can't be the sum total of a person's complexity. Rather, Neville emphasizes Pharrell's faith in God, his devotion to his friends—such as helping a down-on-his-luck Pusha T score a hit—and his seemingly boundless creativity as the main talking points.
Those aims leave many other narrative questions unanswered. Neville and Pharrell make it a point that the Neptunes were locked in a music deal with Teddy Riley, but it's never explained how the group broke out of that deal once they found representation. Pharrell's parents appear as comic relief, but not much else is revealed about them. Pharrell's songwriting process is likened to putting together Lego pieces until they shine, a la the lightbulb above a great idea. Nothing else is said of his actual methodology.
Most of all, the film rarely finds inventive ways to talk about Pharrell's inner life. Sequences where the artist's synesthesia is represented onscreen are the exception, roaring as vibrant, blooming hues of hypnotic color. There are other whimsical moments, such as a statue of Neptune coming alive or Pharrell imagining himself being left out at sea by nefarious A&R men. But this film is never as playful as it'd like you to believe.
Instead, the overstretched and underthought "Piece by Piece" constantly struggles to check the boxes of its genre requirements. The musical sequences lack originality, the Lego animation doesn't go beyond the expected sheen, the biopic elements are too controlled and the humor is intermittent. Also: Who exactly is this movie for? With its heavy expletives, it's certainly not for kids. And its animated nature makes you wonder how many adults will gravitate toward a movie trying to straddle the line between winking and clean. There are simply too many chunks missing from "Piece by Piece" for it to be as memorable as its subject.
This review was filed from the premiere at the Telluride Film Festival. The film opens on October 11, 2024.
