Pharrell Williams LEGO Documentary by Morgan Neville

In Piece by pieceMorgan Neville (Don't you want to be my neighbor?, 20 feet from fame) attempts to subvert the conventions of the celebrity documentary by using LEGOs. Yes, you read that right: LEGOs.

Previewed in Telluride ahead of its October 11 theatrical release by Focus Features, Piece by piece tells the life story of the multi-talented Pharrell Williams through elaborately designed set pieces composed of animations of the popular plastic bricks. If there's anyone for whom this wouldn't be a completely strange and out-of-place idea, it's Williams, whose career has been defined by a spirited irreverence. From his childhood in Virginia Beach and continuing through his highly successful music career, Piece by piece reveals, in sweet and thought-provoking terms, how the producer turned rapper, singer and fashion icon has never been one to pigeonhole himself.

But while creative, Neville's documentary fails to entirely avoid the pitfalls of the celebrity-produced biopic, and is predictably characterised by typical hagiographic evasiveness.

To be honest, Piece by piecewith its PG rating, it seems geared toward a younger audience, and the box office success of The Lego Movie probably bodes well for its theatrical release. Neville fills the documentary with scenes encouraging self-acceptance and vague platitudes about finding the higher calling in your dreams. And while they may be moving, they aren’t as compelling as the moments when Williams lets her story speak for itself.

The liveliest parts of Piece by piece are when the musician talks about his childhood in Virginia Beach. The use of LEGO animations allows for a vivid portrayal of life in the Atlantis Apartments, a housing complex whose community inspired him. The way people listened to music from their windows, relaxed in the courtyard, and had each other’s backs nurtured a young Williams even when he felt out of place. The building blocks are also a wonderful way to represent Williams’ synesthesia, a neurological condition that causes people to experience more than one sense at a time. When listening to music, Williams saw different colors, patterns, and, in his words, “beautiful waterfalls of light.”

Williams knew that people thought he was strange, especially when he started school. Those early college years were alienating and difficult for the artist, who struggled to concentrate during class. He eventually had to repeat a year. Interviews with Williams' parents complement Neville's interview with the musician.

A young Williams didn’t find his place until he began taking music lessons at the encouragement of his grandmother, who took him to church and bought him his first drum kit. He met his Neptunes bandmate Chad Hugo at those lessons. Together, the pair would skip school and perform, creating music that represented their eclectic tastes and experiences. Magic happened when Williams made music, and a similar kind of enchantment happens when he talks about it.

Another strong point of Piece by piece is how LEGO animation enhances our understanding of Williams’s process. It can be difficult to capture creation in a documentary, but here Neville, with the help of editors Jason Zeldes, Aaron Wickenden, and Oscar Vazquez, delivers dynamic sequences that offer glimpses into how Williams’s mind works. The way Williams talks about matching beats to specific artists or finding the right sound to complete a record confirms his genius. Beats become objects with lives of their own, meticulously catalogued and curated by the artist. Inspiration for songs can come from anything, including the sound of a can of spray paint. (It’s worth noting that Williams has five original songs in the documentary, which complement Michael Andrews’s imaginative score.)

From Snoop Dogg’s “Drop it Like It’s Hot” to Britney Spears’ “I’m a Slave 4 U,” Williams and Hugo, collaborating as the Neptunes, produced many of the hottest chart-topping records of the late ’90s and early 2000s. Interviews with Timbaland, Missy Elliot, Snoop Dogg, and Jay Z add energetic anecdotes that help build a portrait of Williams as a fledgling producer.

When Piece by piece chronicles Williams’s final years, the documentary begins to mirror much of what audiences have come to expect from celebrity film projects. The use of LEGO animation doesn’t quite mask the relative subtlety of those parts of the narrative.

There are some touching moments, though, like when Williams speaks candidly about how early success inflated his ego to the point of alienating his closest friends, or how he found himself producing for Kendrick Lamar and writing his own Despicable Me 2 awards “Happy.” One wonders if some of these more stressful moments in Williams' life might not have been better captured with live footage.

At a brisk 90 minutes, Piece by piece doesn't have much time to dwell on it, and that obviously leaves some questions — about the details of Hugo and Williams' estrangement and reconciliation, or what happened to Williams during his creatively fallow years. So while Piece by piece It will undoubtedly inspire audiences, but it won't always make us feel closer to its subject.