Jack Cullen muses on Gaga’s already notorious smash hit cinema venture
This past month, we put Netflix on pause and clobbered down the street to cough up at our local cinnies and see our Steph in her latest project – like paying gay tax. Stefani Germanotta (like a German otter?) better known as Lady Gaga, her stage name which is actually a Freddie Mercury lyric superglued onto a bit of 2005, is now an actor, in one of this year’s biggest movies – A Star Is Born.
Social media sprang to life; basic gays ‘screaming’ at Shangela memes (the film has a bunch of Ru spawn in it of course) while pretentious gays set to work comparing the film to its previous renditions, which they probably watched at grammar school. Yes, the film is a remake, but Gaga is a pro when it comes to copying. Serena Williams didn’t invent tennis, but she’s good at it, and like Serena, Gaga is a winner (turns a blind eye to Joanne). It’s to Gaga’s credit that such fanfare constantly surrounds her. She plays the media as well as she can any stadium. Haters gonna hate, and let’s face it – Jennifer Garner would kill for someone to talk about a film she’s in.
Described by one paper as “old-fashioned big-feel cinema”, a genre you might call Make Cinema Great Again! this film certainly grips and manipulates its audience, for an hour at least. Gaga is electric and convincing in her role as Ally and her voice is fantastic. As for Bradley Cooper’s character, his name “Jackson Maine” conveys exactly what he is; Jack Daniels: The Musical. Watching Jackson is like being stuck in Timberland overnight. His performance, largely a series of well-lit shots of his gorgeous oily hair, shows him slouching back groaning or hunching forwards grumbling (something about a farm?) His masculine identity crashes in sepia across various hospitality sofas, backstage service tables and editing suites, his FrizzEase catches the light, both a perk and a danger of directing one’s self.
The film’s major hokum moment is Ally’s big break, after singing a snippet of a self-penned song to Bradley while they’re both smashed in a car park, they somehow manage to wing it as a fully-fleshed-out duet with full arrangements and no sound checks at a major festival two days later. And soon Ally is busy discussing extensive tour plans in the calm matter-of-fact tones of a national treasure. She doesn’t even throw a party for her friends, but she does let Willam FaceTime her.
The music is good, if not immediately memorable. The Shallow is the standout track, twinks wasting no time in assassinating it in karaoke bars across the land, getting all that emosh ghosting off their chests. There’s something instantaneously familiar about the song, a kind of Adele meets Whitney meets Christian camp. Or maybe it’s just G.U.Y unplugged and played backwards – someone check! A Guardian review gushed that the soundtrack was “packed with instant classics”, but I don’t expect my Mum to be humming it when I’m home for Christmas. That’s the benchmark of “instant classic”. Can your Mum hum it? Hey Ya is an instant classic and so is Go Compare.
The film uses lazy shorthand to convey authentic self versus artistic compromise. Straw-chewing, whiskey-swigging, guitar-strumming angst equates to genuine. While hair dye and electronic beats means superficial crap, which is of course total wank. The music industry is littered with talentless guitar-based wish-wash, as much as it is populated by pioneering, intelligent electro and pop. But A Star Is Born drills in generalisations that a mass audience will enjoy. Dancers are dismissed as facile, frilly background add-ons to boost sales. Managers are interfering busybodies. Ally’s increasingly bold fashion highlights her slightly fraudulent new act, and she is made to look a tad foolish – dressing like a slutty salsa teacher from Telford. Despite the film’s suggestion that commercial pop is bullshit, Ally’s fictional hit Why Did You Do That is the movie’s best song with its borderline insane lyrics and masochistic repetition.
It’s a shame Gaga didn’t make her big screen debut a mind-blowing modern arthouse epic more in the lineage of Rocky Horror, Party Monster or Dancer In The Dark? Perhaps she’s scratched that itch already with her music clips, or maybe she’s playing a longer game, cementing her name into the bible belt. Word on the street is she’s going for an Oscar – neighbours spotted her practising a speech in her garden at night, in-between frantically sewing together Pepperamis.
A Star Is Born might still be in cinemas, we’re not sure – it probably is. Follow Jack Cullen on Twitter @JackCullenUK
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