As competitive reality shows go, Project Runway is pretty unsympathetic stuff. Tim Gunn and Heidi Klum toss off stoic catchphrases like “Make it work” and “Auf wiedersehen” not so much as sympathy for the contestants as to remind viewers: Bitches mean business. That no-nonsense attitude is about as close to the reality of the fashion industry as you can get. The problem with Eleven Minutes, the “painfully raw” documentary following a year in the life of the Bravo show’s premier winner, Jay McCarroll, is that directors Michael Selditch and Robert Tate feel a little too sorry for their subject. Like the fans who send McCarroll email love letters, they fawn over his design sketches, even inserting them into the credits. Industry talking heads like the absurdly bitchy publicist Kelly Cutrone (of The Hills fame) are used mostly for background screeching, leaving the doc with very little in the way of context or insight into the fashion world it penetrates. This show belongs to the schlubby and enjoyably sarcastic McCarroll, who cries out for attention often and loudly, offering close-up monologues about his need to prove himself. He really does want to be the Next Great American Designer, in the language of the show where he made his name, and the filmmakers basically treat him as such. Which makes this a movie for Project Runway obsessives only.
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