Piece by Piece (in cinemas, from today)

In uncertain times, the disconcertingly strange can be comforting – as Hunter S. Thompson said, when the going gets weird, the weird turn professional.

And so, as the world melts, Pharrell Williams releases an autobiographical celebrity documentary made entirely from Lego. It’s as odd as it sounds. Williams has synesthesia – a condition which confuses sensory reactions.

To convey this, director Morgan Neville spins him into outer space or traps him inside a whirlpool. Kendrick Lamar, Missy Elliott, Snoop Dogg, Gwen Stefani and Jay-Z are interviewed in Lego form.

This defies the purpose of a documentary by obscuring a curious cultural figure. Pharrell wrote “Blurred Lines”, but Robin Thicke took the bullet. He released “Happy” in the year Black Lives Matter launched.

In a Fast Company interview, he had no idea how many people he employed but knew only two of them were men. Pharrell builds a protective Lego wall on the screen, and the result – like his music - is both bewilderingly entertaining and meaningless.