‘Project Greenlight’ Review: Max Reboot Excels With Candid Look at Highs and Lows of Filmmaking

For aspiring filmmakers, appreciators of how the sausage is made and lovers of atypically blunt reality messiness, “Project Greenlight: A New Generation” is essential viewing. From the Max reboot’s welcome focus on inclusive expansion, its gutsy willingness to show its subjects’ warts in extreme close-up and ultimate promise for a better tomorrow, this is easily the best season of the reality show, which first aired in 2001, and will easily be the best reality show of the year.

Gone are original producers and sometimes on-camera superstars Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. In their place are new producers and mentors Kumail Nanjiani, Gina Prince-Bythewood, and Issa Rae (who even makes a joke about Damon and Affleck “rolling in their graves”). Their goal is simple on paper, and borderline Sisyphean in execution: Give a first-time feature filmmaker a low-budget genre film to make, and document the entire process from pre-production to premiere.

The genre film in question is titled “Gray Matter,” which itself will premiere on Thursday, July 13, on Max. It’s a drama with science fiction elements, to paraphrase a pervasive talking point from the show. The movie stars Mia Isaac (“Not Okay”), Jessica Frances Dukes (“Ozark”) and Garret Dillahunt (“Ambulance”), and it’s directed by the real star of the show, Meko Winbush, who won the assignment from thousands of submissions. “Project Greenlight” shows Winbush building rails inches in front of a fast-moving train as countless collaborators do their best to foster the debut filmmaker’s vision (a word Winbush comes to hate), including members of Rae’s production company and Max execs. And somehow, through the chaos: movie magic.

I don’t use the word “chaos” lightly. The docuseries’ chief draw is its frankness, often at what seems like detriment to its participants. From its famous faces to its behind-the-camera dealmakers, everyone speaks and behaves with piercing candor. The “Gray Matter” script is constantly derided, even through production — yet its credited screenwriter, Philip Gelatt (“Europa Report”), appears smiling and eager to help. Members of Rae’s production company Hoorae are at one point directly accused of sabotage by production company Catchlight, yet the two company’s members later work together to strategize how to give the best creative notes. And the star faces — Nanjiani, Rae and Prince-Bythewood — do not mince words when discussing the shortcomings of the film or its filmmaker, Winbush, who is sometimes positioned as the star of a Cinderella story where the Stepsisters keep criticizing.

As for Winbush herself, she starts the series as an endearing introvert, stammering and looking down, obviously more comfortable communicating with a camera. But as the series progresses, and the frustrations of production mount, she becomes more than willing to cut down these established figures of the industry, show up late to meetings and bail on crew members during what feel like essential workdays. Those who have predilections to Monday morning quarterback will find many vicarious emotions to work through, and shouts of admonishing demand to ring out (“Just rewrite the script!”). The complete transparency of this character study honestly made me wonder: Will appearing on “Project Greenlight” pay off for Winbush?

To the show’s continuously surprising, and thrillingly metatextual credit, that’s a question constantly raised. In episodes that feel like a cross between recent “Vanderpump Rules” and season 2 of “Community,” conflicts arise between the simultaneous productions being filmed; that is, the television show “Project Greenlight” and the film “Gray Matter.” The filming of the latter is the subject of the former. The former’s existence is necessary for the latter’s.

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And yet, understandably so, the former keeps getting in the way of the latter, and vice versa. “Project Greenlight” crews get in “Gray Matter” shots, ADs start big-dogging each other, essential players turn off mics before elucidating conversations — it’s perplexing, arresting television unlike much I’ve ever seen, culminating in a postmodern meeting of executives that feels like a televisual adaptation of an ouroboros.

What transcends all of this from a more typical reality show — and what I suspect will ensure Winbush comes out of this looking good — is that all of these conflicts aren’t just for the sake of conflict, but for the sake of creating art, and for the sake of ensuring a more welcoming environment for artists to create. I never once thought a person on the show behaved unreasonably, never divided anyone into “heroes” vs. “villains,” never approached a moment with that distanced “train wreck” mindset we sometimes enjoy while watching reality TV.

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Because I knew the goal was noble, and because the show’s subjects kept reminding us that goal was behind all their actions, I was able to engage with nuance, humanity and a hardfought optimism that everyone involved was just trying to leave the filmmaking world better than they found it.

I didn’t walk away feeling beat up; I walked away feeling inspired. And that’s movie magic.

By the end of the 10-episode season, “Project Greenlight: A New Generation” serves as a visceral litmus test for those who want to make movies. If you watch all of these miscommunications, derelictions of duty, brutally honest assessments of skills, and straight up human-to-human conflicts and think to yourself, “I still need to make movies,” then you are right, and we need you, too.

“Project Greenlight: A New Generation” premieres Thursday, July 13, on Max.