The TV Addict 

Even though BE KIND REWIND takes place in a real place (Passaic, N.J.), in the film it’s really a manic silly fairytale land of sorts where cops don’t really do much if they catch you painting graffiti on an underpass wall, where a store that rents VHS copies of movies released no later than the late 90s at a dollar a pop stays in business somehow, and where Jack Black plays a mechanic.

The basic story is that when Mr. Fletcher (Danny Glover) – the owner of the above mentioned video store – leaves town for a week to check out what this crazy DVD fad is all about, he leaves his ward, Mike (Mos Def), in charge of the store, with one warning: “Keep Jerry out.” Of course keeping any character played by Jack Black (essentially reprising his role from HIGH FIDELITY here) away is pretty much near impossible. Sure enough, during a bungled attempt at sabotaging a local power plant (he does so because of threatening microwaves that will kill us all, or something), things go awry and Jerry ends up electrocuted. Instead of getting killed, he somehow gets magnetized in a sequence that seems like it’s out of the origin part of a superhero movie. Needless to say, the next time Jerry comes into the video store, all the tapes get ruined.

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