Confession: I love Justin Bieber. I love his hair. I love his purple sweatshirt. And I really love his song "One Time."
I've been following Justin's career from the very beginning as his manager, Scooter Braun, is a friend of my cousin's. My cousin and Scooter became friends at Emory University in Atlanta. My cousin used to call me late at night when she was hanging out with Scooter and say, "Guess who's new track I just heard?" or "Guess who's tour bus I was just on?" Point being, Scooter is the real deal and he was even at eighteen years old when he was working for Island/Def Jam.
"Never Say Never" is a documentary that follows Justin's road from discovery in his small town in Canada to his first performance at a sold out Madison Square Garden in Manhattan. I would say 90% of the film is concert footage. Though this is fun to watch and the list of celebrity cameos is amazing (Usher, Ludacris, Boyz II Men, Sean Kingston, Miley Cyrus, Jaden Smith), you find yourself wanting to watch more behind the scenes footage instead.
I loved seeing Justin's goofy relationship with his stylist Ryan, his uncle/nephew relationship with his bodyguard Kenny, and his big brother/little brother relationship with Scooter. It's very clear Justin has an invested, caring, genuine team surrounding him.
One of the highlights of the film is watching early YouTube videos and home videos of Justin. He's been playing the drums since he could reach them (really!), he first performed at a church at eight years old and then asked his mom if he could sing on the steps of a local theater. At such a young age he craved performing.
As I was watching the movie I kept thinking - so much planning went into this. They had to decide in advance to follow Justin on the road, at home and with his friends. They had to commit to extra camera people at every show on the tour to make sure the footage was high enough quality for a wide release, big screen movie. They had to conduct interviews, get old photos and video footage and higher a director (Jon M. Chu) who could make this a legitimate production. All of this while still managing the day to day needs of the tour and a star growing in popularity. You have to admit, it's damn impressive.
Mock if you must, but I have Bieber fever.
