The Bling Ring

The movie was so focused on portraying how fake and superficial the individuals who live in this upper-class, American West Coast culture are, that it failed to show their humanity entirely.

The mother’s character was the most poorly portrayed by Sophia Coppola. She failed to capture the intensity of the mother and the mother’s strange relationship with her daughters. The daughters really have a close connection with their mother, however weird, and actually believe in the “And So It Is” thing they say. Alex Nyers wasn’t lying when she said those quotes repeated by Emma Watson in the Vogue Interview; this girl truly believes what she’s saying. I think Emma Watson did an OK job acting considering the horrendous script she had to work with but unfortunately, I can’t get on her side. I don’t believe in the sisterhood between the two older girls in the movie… These girls are best friends and also fiercely competitive but none of that came through.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have expected the movie to focus so much on the 2 sisters but I’m disappointed that this story wasn’t told.

In order for me to feel and understand the pull of having nice things, wealth and fame, I needed to be seduced by the ringmaster of the group. I wasn’t, unfortunately. She was vapid and boring and I believe there’s more to the real person than that.

It’s easy to write these girls off as rich, entitled, materialistic little bitches but what about exploring the pull of celebrity culture? Fame and wealth and beauty entices everyone to an extent. When it’s so close that all you have to do is take a deep breath and push open a door to get it, what can ever limit you? I wanted to see these boundaries explored and real emotions about right, wrong and the ability to disregard common sense in search of adrenaline and wealth.

Instead the movie offers us all the material things but none of the acting to make it real.

I understand the challenge- how do you tell a story that everyone knows the ending to? Well, it’s not about the ending in that case, it’s about the relationships, the betrayal, the friendship and the reputation these individuals got in their circle of friends for stealing from celebrities. Alas, the trailer shows all the best parts of the movie. There’s also a car accident and little exploration of it’s consequences except for a laughed off “I was off the charts, they didn’t even know how I was driving.” Consequences may be a foreign thing to these kids, but I need the movie to explore why and how that is.

Skip this movie and watch “Pretty Wild” on Netflix. It’s the real thing and it’s better than the movie.

$4 Tuesday: Ginger & Rosa

Edit: Throughout the first part of the movie Ginger and Rosa are so close that they even wear the same things. But people change, they have to. As each girl discovers more her own individual identity they realize that the things that bonded them together as children can no longer bond them as adults. Is the ending of their friendship inevitable?

They said Elle Fanning would be sensational, and they did not lie. I just saw Ginger & Rosa directed by Sally Potter for today’s installment of 4$ Tuesday.

*Spoiler Alerts*

In 1960s London, at the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Ginger and Rosa are best friends and do everything together. Ginger, played phenomenally by Elle Fanning, is a budding activist who is deeply disturbed by the state of the world and is internalizing the stress of it all with the growing intensity and despair in the way that only revolutionary young adults do. She is a child in a world in which she sees no other choice but to be the grown up, in the micro-sense because of her dysfunctional parents inability to be adults and in the macro-sense as she confronts the government’s irresponsible and potentially lethal actions.

Rosa is religious and prefers a peaceful approach to the war over Ginger’s urgent need for forceful action. She’s flirtatious with boys and embraces her sexuality inclinations without much thought to the consequences and likewise unperturbed by the consequences in the end. Rosa develops a flirtation with Ginger’s father, Roland. Rosa and Ginger begin to drift apart as Ginger becomes closer to the activist movement and Rosa becomes closer to Ginger’s father. As Rosa and Roland develop an intimate relationship, Ginger struggles to cope with the deceit of her friend and family. Roland is a revolutionary whose articles are respected by Vietnam protesters. He tells Ginger “Every man must fight for his own authority, his own autonomous thoughts. Which means you shouldn’t listen to a word I say.”

Roland’s immaturity and hypocrisy show through when he tries to convince Ginger to understand him and his life philosophy, which has dictated his carpe diem actions even at the expense of his daughter’s lifelong friendship and well-being. The ending makes you wonder if Ginger has forgiven him. I don’t believe she does because the “I forgive you” that we hear narrated is from a poem to Rosa and does not depart from its train of thought to address Roland, who is in the scene by circumstance.

As strong as Elle Fanning’s performance is in this film, the weak points rest on newcomer Alice Englert’s character, Rosa. The film had the opportunity to explore the complexity of Rosa, but instead I was left feeling like I just could never get on her side because it was never made to feel appealing or logical. Instead we are left with a bitter taste in our mouths for a girl who has so easily hurt her friend and thrown their friendship away. Was there no internal struggle there? Rosa is delusional and thinks she can help Roland and that they are bonded by something other than a physical attraction. I wanted to feel Rosa’s pain, her conflicting emotions towards her friend and the tension of her budding sexuality pulling her to Roland. I didn’t get any of this. Instead it was more like a you-don’t-particularly-care-about-your-friends’-feelings-and-the-consequences-of-your-actions-plus-you’re-a-slut kinda vibe. When it comes to the war, Rosa is a pacifist, who chooses prayer over protest, religion over rebellion. Meanwhile, the intensity of Ginger’s emotions come across clearly, twisted and raw from the many stresses in her life that cannot be pushed away through prayer and attention from boys.

Christina Hendricks, who plays Ginger’s mother, gives a fairly weak performance, using a British accent that sounds authentically forced.

Overall though, I really did enjoy this film. I walked away considering my own point in time and the stresses in my own life. I relate to Ginger and her desperation. Though not the 1960s. the crisis of my generation is that of overpopulation, starvation, contamination, and climate change. I used to feel constant desperation and now I often feel hopeless. The human race is facing the greatest test: Our imminent mortality on a massive scale. There is only a matter of time before mass migration and wars over clean water cause issues more pressing than ever before. And there are days when I feel like I will explode too. And I have no answers.

Favorite Quotes:

-I think we should do something about the bomb, you know, protest.

-I think we should pray.

Can’t you be a girl for just a minute or two longer?

There’s poetry in small spaces… a beauty in confinement.

But I don’t want to die, I want to grow up and do things!

Happy is not really an option when the whole world is about to be blown to pieces.

I’d prefer the world not to end, wouldn’t you?

And I will say, “I loved you, Rosa.”

It’s worth seeing despite it’s weak points.

hsg