I know David Lowery from The Green Knight, which I thought was incredible. He's done other stuff, but it's all stuff I'm not familiar with. I maaaay have seen the Peter Pan movie he made, but I don't think so. I feel like I'd remember that. I think I'm thinking of the one with Jeremy Sumpter.
Anyway, I liked The Green Knight, and I really like stories about musicians and singers. Especially ones dealing with fame. I'm currently deep into writing a story about a pop star who's a vampire, and watching this movie was most definitely vibing with what I'm doing. Sometimes when something feels connected or inline with something I've made or that I'm working on, I get intimidated or even freaked out, because I worry that people will think I was inspired by, or even stole from it. It's happened before. There are a lot of different people telling a lot of stories, and sometimes they're very similar to other stories, either by design or by coincidence.
Either way, I didn't feel that way about this, because this is a very different story about a very different character than my story and character, but I feel they could be in the same circles as each other.
I love a story about relationships. Complicated, difficult relationships. Especially through the lens of mental illness and trauma. This is very much a story about a traumatic and toxic relationship that manages to still be beautiful and lovely.
This particular relationship is one whose history and complexities reveal themselves over the course of the movie in a consistently captivating and endless watchable set of performances.
As a former Swiftie (it's... been a challenging year or so for me and Tay) I'm comfortable saying that many aspects of Anne Hathaway's character are plainly Taylor coded. That's a good thing. It gives us an immediately understandable and relatable foundation to build her character and performance on. The concert scenes are especially interesting to watch, because they're one part Taylor and one part Lady Gaga, in that the performances are very much art pieces. That's a big part of the story, and it's important to have that context of these real life figures and their place in pop culture.
All of that is to say that Anne Hathaway does a fantastic job playing the psychologically fractured lead role of Mother Mary. She's broken and yet also strong. It's a delicate thing and she balances it well.
Michaela Coel plays Sam, the fashion designer who has been tasked with creating a kind of send off ultimate performance piece dress for Mary. Their history is complex and nuanced, and handled perfectly. Michaela Coel is incredible... downright incredible in this movie. She's at the same time powerful, guarded, and desperately wounded, but also fiercely intelligent and even wiley. She so, so good.
Also in the cast are Hunter Schafer and FKA twigs, both in small but memorable roles. Most of the movie is either Anne and Michaela playing off each other, or Anne performing as Mother Mary. Both are extremely entertaining. There were moments in that movie were I was grinning because I was having such a great time. That honestly doesn't happen to me very often.
Not because I'm cynical or jaded, but because this movie in particular combined so many things that I love about watching movies, that it reminded me of why I love movies. It was just a home run for me. I really loved it. I want to watch it again. I want to hear a director's commentary. I want to learn everything there is to know about this movie. It's my favorite so far this year I think. In fact, it is. It's my favorite movie of the year thus far.
And my god was it gorgeous. The colors, the fashion, the dresses, the lights, the bodies. I loved watching this movie for so many reasons, but the visuals were what grabbed me the most. Some of it reminded me of Under the Skin, which certainly isn't a bad thing. That slowburn psychosexual tension was definitely a big part of it. But unlike Under the Skin, I didn't leave this movie feeling depleted and like I'd been through some stuff. I left this movie feeling inspired and revitalized creatively. I felt like I'd seen something very good and special, and I'm so happy I did.
It's also motivated me to really get to work on my Vampire Popstar story, Scout's Arrival. It's broken up into nine days, and will be a novel length collection of stories about Scout Farrow, a pop star who is also a vampire. I really like this story and I think it's fairly unique. So that's what I'm going to be working on.
I took a little break from writing, but it's nice to be back in it and working again. It's very healing, writing about this stuff. I hope I can finish this book this year and get it out. Looking forward to that.
Anyway, that's all I've got for now.
OH
BTW
We're watching Paradise and it's BAD ASS. You should watch it.