“It’s like a spice,” Blake Mills says at one point during “Really Good Rejects” of the guitars designed by Reuben Cox, speaking from his veritable kitchen Sound City, the music studios in Los Angeles. “Once you get it in your head, you think that would be good in this [song or that one].”
In fact, like that hint of coriander you might not notice in a curry without the benefit of a refined palette, the sound of Cox’s unique string instruments come alive in Alice Gu’s engaging portrait of the proprietor of the Silver Lake-based Old Style Guitar Shop, in accompanying tunes from the National, Sleater-Kinney and Jeff Tweedy, even if the musicians themselves didn’t attest to his innovation in interviews. A professional photographer who was drawn towards building guitars as a hobby – the film’s subject describes both as process-oriented without immediate satisfaction – Cox started to find himself spending less time behind the camera than following leads on wood that could create an interesting reverb, sourcing mahogany where he could find it, whether it was once a kitchen shelf from an old cabin or a discarded bed frame and working it towards a perfect pitch.
While you get the sense that Cox isn’t one to talk much about himself, presented as a calm, gentle spirit who would rather be tucked away into a corner of his shop, Gu finds no shortage of volunteers to speak to his prowess and seem particularly excited to talk about what makes a good guitar, which the filmmaker is wise to lean into even when it means there are long digressions that would seem to mirror its main subject’s craftsmanship where the less obvious route produces a sweeter sound. The director, who previously eased audiences into a fascinating story of Cambodian refugee resettlement in the U.S. during the reign of the Khmer Rouge under the delicious profile of entrepreneur Ted Ngoy in “The Donut King,” starts with Cox’s influence, creating the Rubber Bridge guitar with its subdued sound that has can be heard everywhere from Taylor Swift’s “Folklore” to Phoebe Bridgers’ “Punisher,” but extends into a thoughtful rumination on the instrument becoming an extension of a musician’s emotions. Carrie Brownstein reflecting on the confidence her guitar gave her when she wanted to change Sleater-Kinney’s sound and Jackson Browne noting that passing a guitar around the room will inevitably lead to no one playing a note exactly the same.
A few familiar beats for music fans will naturally make their way into “Really Good Rejects” when just a few years before Dave Grohl made an entire doc on Sound City and the indie rock royalty that Gu sits down with has become ubiquitous in at least some small part because of Cox’s inventive guitars, but when Brazilian multiinstrumentalist Rodrigo Amerante can be seen biting into the headstock at the top of his guitar as a means of demonstration, you know you’re in for something different. “Really Good Rejects” benefits greatly from the candid insights Gu is able to elicit and the inclination to follow a good story wherever it leads and a deep dive into just one ingredient of what can make a piece of music special ends up making for a sumptuous feast.
“Really Good Rejects” does not yet have U.S. distribution.