Review: "A Star"...Needs To End
If Bradley Cooper never directs a movie again, I’ll be okay.
I went into A Star is Born with the full intention and expectation of loving it. What I watched instead was tacky, claustrophobic, dated, clunky, and irrelevant. It wasn't hard to tell that the cinematography was completely at the inexperienced direction from Cooper: every shot tight, every close up clear, never seeing the world outside of our two stars. This style was permissible for much of the movie, especially when we are supposed to feel exactly how our protagonist feels, see what our protagonist sees. But over the course of a two and a half hour movie, it became exhausting and frustrating. All the song sequences were three minutes of a stage and the camera circling around and around and around and around…If only we got a tiny look outside of their world, especially for Cooper’s character. Gaga’s acting has been the main story from this film, with many already leading an Oscar charge for the pop star. I found her acting passable, if not exceptional. Her vocal range stole the show and the chemistry between she and Cooper was out of this world.
A Star Is Born succeeded in small ways, though not enough for me to ever want to watch it again. The small shining moments were in the beginning: the painful awkwardness of Gaga and Cooper's first meeting at a bar, then outside in the parking lot made my skin crawl, in the best possible way. We’ve all been in situations like those, unsure of when to make the first move, overwhelmed by someone’s beauty and talent and engrossed in everything they do. The palpable tension was out of this world; I even turned to my friend Morgan and said “Am I being pranked? What is this movie?" And can I just say..."Why Did You Do That" is a GREAT song. Those moments were awkward, foolish, and so magical.
From then on it went downhill, though.
From a Dave Chappelle cameo with no real purpose, to a subplot about hearing loss that was nothing more than a cheap reason to give him an excuse to be angry. There was a scorn for pop music and popular culture that left a bad taste in my mouth. The lack of 21st-century social media when Gaga's character is virtually taking over the world was a strange choice; it’s tough to imagine a star so omnipresent so quickly without having to have some tweet or Instagram to solidify a story for TMZ. I felt like we were stuck in a time warp. Many unimportant, useless scenes filled the two hours plus. Tons of montages, tons of one-liners never expounded upon, many random characters there for no reason. With a sloppy story and poor editing, the entire film felt clunky and long. At the end of the day, it was a simple story we’ve watched three times before, and somehow it still left something to be desired. Aesthetic choices were made that some people seem to be enjoying, but I can say with full confidence, this was a film made for people like me and yet it still managed to fall short of my expectations. So yes, if Bradley Cooper never directs again I’ll be okay. That being said, if Bradley Cooper keeps this Jackson Maine look I WILL be in love with him forever. Who doesn't love a problematic, addicted, angry hot man? Just, you know, with a few more wide shots and a little less mumbling.