[ad_1]
Esther Blodgett (Janet Gaynor), in the 1937 movie "A Star is Born," has a dream: to leave the life of a small town in North Dakota and become a movie star. It will not be easy because we are reminded again and again. "Every time you realize one of your dreams, you will pay the price, you will be heartbroken," says his rough but supportive grandmother clearly.
Of course, she pays. Norman Maine (Fredric March), a self-destructive movie star whose career is on the decline, gives her the respite she needs; so they fall in love. However, her alcoholism only worsens as she becomes famous, and her addiction ultimately threatens to make her lose her career. After hearing her confess that she intends to stop acting to take care of him, he kills himself, his death allowing him to triumph, both professionally and as a woman loved by a man. "Hello everyone," she says at the next screening of her movie. "This is Mrs. Norman Maine."
The periods, casts and settings varied, but that's the pattern that all the remakes followed: in 1954, Judy Garland in the role of Esther and James Mason in the role of Norman and in a 1976 version with Barbra Streisand in the role of Esther Hoffman and Kris. Kristofferson as John Norman Howard who is transplanting the drama into the music industry. Then there's the last one, "A Star is Born" by Bradley Cooper.
In her directorial debut, there has never been such an explicit statement about what Ally Campana (Lady Gaga) has to sacrifice to become the musical sensation she dreams of being, but this message remains palpable. After being pulled out of the dark by a rock star, Jackson Maine (Cooper), Ally's persistent love for him threatens to derail his flourishing career – until he loses himself for her.
The 1937 version – which would have been inspired at least in part by a previous movie, "What Price Hollywood?" – was designed during the Great Depression. (Realistic William A. Wellman, and his team of writers including Dorothy Parker.) For her time, the film begins surprisingly progressive, refuting the idea that Esther should find herself a husband with a speech Inspiring grandmother Lettie in which settling in the West is equated with the project of Esther becoming an actress.
In other ways, however, the film echoes the films of his day: Esther de Gaynor must choose between career and love; she can not have both. And being a woman in a 1930s movie almost always meant choosing love.
In 2018, the relationship between Ally and Jackson is presented in a less simple way, inspired by the version of Streisand, rightly decried (it's a confusing mess, with little chemistry between the stars). This remake (directed by Frank Pierson, who adapted with Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne) aimed to update Esther for the era of women's liberation – the result is the same, but her commitment to him then fails that it is never the same with the first Esthers.
Once Ally has been unraveled alone, she shows signs of impatience with Jackson's addictions: after missing a major performance because of a frenzy, she reprimands him for telling him that if it happened again, he would have to clean up his own mess. This infuses a conflict into their dynamic that implies that Ally did not completely lose her sense of self. Similarly, Esther de Streisand dresses the rock star John after finding her in bed with a journalist who was supposed to interview him: "You can worry about life, but you're not going to bother me," he says. she, broken heart.
Esther / Ally's responses to John / Jackson show that the women break up while allowing them to let go of the women's anger – Streisand breaks the bottles of alcohol with a pool cue – while remaining unable to resist the care of the women. men of their lives. In movies, such expressions of fury are often described negatively, as hysterical, vengeful, sinister. Or they are not described at all: Esther of Gaynor, a dreamer with big eyes, lacks this anger. Garland's portrait corresponds to almost every performance she gives, from the "Wizard of Oz" to her famous concert at Carnegie Hall, deeply enveloped in pathos and vulnerability.
Ally's exasperation stems in large part from the way Cooper made Jackson, which fits more explicitly than previous versions into the preoccupation of the story about the emasculation of his uncontrollable star, which faces the loss of his job and his fan base, and therefore his power. .
Jackson thinks that Ally "has something to say," and he repeats this mantra throughout the film as an encouragement. But it's also the way he belittles her when he's jealous. When she tells him that she has been approached about a manager for her career, a drunken Jackson responds by crushing her a cream cheese bagel. The timing is troubling – it's hard to tell if Jackson is angry, too far to handle the news or a bit of both – but it's not, until Ally gets his first Grammy nominations. Jackson can no longer contain his bitterness, throwing insults and criticizing her for being sold with a foamy pop song. (The film adopts an archaic rockist attitude, pop is "false" and the singer-songwriter is in a way "the truth".) To plunge the knife even deeper, he calls it "ugly" , knowing very well that she looks like have been the subject of harsh criticism all her life.
No scene like this exists in previous versions. Although the fall of Norman in 1937 makes the fall painfully obvious (Esther's name Esther, Vicki Lester replaces his on a billboard), he still supports Esther unreservedly. When he struggles, it is not Esther, but a press agent who narrates him to live by his wife.
Norman de Mason in 1954 is closer to Jackson Cooper. When he drunkenly disrupts Esther's acceptance speech at the Oscars – a scene that appears at each iteration – he begs his peers of the audience to give him a job, a humiliation that increasingly despises Esther's accomplishments . To avoid spoiling, he hits her face, revealing the threatening nature of her alcoholism.
Jackson feels like the most realistic and contemporary version of the male figure in this central relationship – his criticism of Ally for his own weaknesses echoes the conversation that is currently going on around male resentment (mostly white) about lost jobs and the feeling that women earn in society, men lose a lot.
The key moment of the last act – Jackson's suicide – is treated more carefully than in previous versions while reinforcing some outdated details. The director, Rez, told her discouragingly that Ally would ruin her image if she remained married to a "fool". When Jackson learns that Ally is planning to cancel his European tour rather than leaving him behind, he decides to commit suicide. Canceling a tour may not be as radical as retiring, as Esther wanted in the 1937 and 1954 versions (Esther of 1976 does not express the desire to leave), but it is a not back in Ally's career. Cooper and her co-writers avoid doing the direct cause of Jackson's suicide; he recounts an unsuccessful attempt before meeting her. But it's her fear that Ally will lose everything she's been working on so she can take care of him – Jackson makes the choice for her.
Last month, rapper Mac Miller died at age 26 from a suspected drug overdose. He had long struggled against addiction and he was open about it; That would also have led to the end of her relationship with pop star Ariana Grande earlier this year. In May, she responded to someone who blamed her for her post-breakup problems, tweeting that it is "absurd" to think "someone should stay in a toxic relationship".
Grande was cleverly confronted with the persistent belief that women must and want to take care of men, even when it costs them their own well-being. It's the same belief that is at the root of every "One Star is Born" and Cooper defies it in some ways while promoting it in others. It should be noted that no remake has attempted to exchange the sexes of its rising and falling stars.
As disturbing as it is, the story of loving an addict remains compelling. This is the tragedy that Hollywood continues to recycle and continues to attract audiences, including mine. Ally, like the Esther before her, pays for her success with sorrow, but the way she lands there is as messy and fascinating as their relationship.
[ad_2]
Source link
