8/10
Instead of calling her kids downstairs in the morning with,
“Kids! Come get your cereal” or “Come
get your toast,” Nicki’s (Emma Watson) mom yells, “Come get your
Adderall!” The Bling Ring introduces
us to a different sort of adolescent; a variation raised by parents who home
school them based on “The Secret” and whose entire world revolves not around
music, movies, or sports, but around designers, popular clubs, and well, bling.
Based on the Vanity Fair article “The Suspect Wore
Louboutins” by Nancy Jo Sales, which catapulted the thieving crew to reality TV
fame, The Bling Ring follows a handful of teenagers who troll gossip
websites, confirm a celebrity is out of town, and burglarize their houses of
cash, designer clothes, booze, and drugs.
Nicki is based on Alexis Neiers, one of the guilty pilferers, who went
on to land her own reality show after all of the movie’s events.
The story is not an indictment by writer/director Sofia
Coppola of today’s youth. Everybody realizes
these kids are not emblematic of their peers; they are a unique subset best
used as an example to represent the consequences of being raised to worship
Prada instead of Princeton. Getting a
DUI, just like Lindsay Lohan, is seen as a badge of respect in this group.
The group, all Caucasian and mostly the spawn of financially
well off parents, do not talk like they are from the Hollywood Hills, but
rather south central. They blast the
latest hip-hop, rap along with lyrics that have nothing to do with their lives,
and consider themselves special. Their
main hobby appears to be taking ‘selfies’ to post on Facebook. Coppola intermittently takes the audience out
of the parties and robberies to have one of the kids speak directly to the
camera. They spew the latest fashionable
excuses such as, “I was suffering from self loathing” or “She was projecting
her issues onto me.”
Considering yourself the victim when you are actually the
perpetrator must border on some sociopathic disorder scale. After awhile, what begins as kind of a dare
or a lark to break into a famous person’s house, becomes routine. Coppola gives us a good look at the inside of
Paris Hilton’s house, a gang favorite that they frequently return to. Paris even cooperated with the film since it
is actually her house they filmed in.
Coppola conveys the routine calculation of it all when two of the kids
invade Audrina Patridge’s home but keeps the camera focused on the house from
the outside of the house hoisted high up as if in a tree. Lights turn on and off, the burglars move
methodically from room to room, yet the camera only observes and waits.
There are other breaks such as this when the action slows
down, the throbbing bass of whatever club tune is blaring fades to whisper, and
it gives the audience a chance to pause, observe, and ultimately shake their
heads at the complete ignorance they are witnessing on screen. Emma Watson does an outstanding job
portraying a girl who is going to have a rough life. Her British accent is gone and replaced the
whiny pitch of someone you really would not want to get locked in a
conversation with. Watson obviously
studied the mannerisms of vapidity and nails them down cold.
Even though Watson is the biggest star in the film, her
character Nicki is not a ringleader and occupies a supporting role even though
she is the most interesting/audacious person on screen. The leaders, Rebecca (Katie Chang) and Marc
(Israel Broussard) begin the whole exercise, select most of the targets, and
maintain a nebulous relationship. Are
they boyfriend/girlfriend, just friends, something in the middle? Coppola does not address their relationship
because that is not what the movie is about, but there are so many scenes with
Rebecca and Marc together one naturally starts to guess at what they feel about
each other.
The Bling Ring is Coppola’s fifth film and ranks about right in
the middle of her work. Lost
in Translation (2003) was one of the best films of the previous decade
but I enjoyed the bumbling teenagers better than Stephen Dorff’s aimless movie
star from Somewhere (2010).
Compared to Spring Breakers, a film from earlier this year following a
group of girls not too far removed from these, The Bling Ring is
downright profound even though it never passes judgment on any of the
characters.
Directed by: Sofia Coppola
Written by: Sofia Coppola, Nancy Jo Sales
Starring: Katie Chang, Israel Broussard, Emma Watson, Claire Julien, Taissa Farmiga, Georgia Rock, Leslie Mann, Carlos Miranda, Gavin Rossdale
I felt a bit like an accomplice just watching this. It felt like we were double dipping on the disgust. Once for the perpetrators, and once for the victims. I know not all kids will act this way or find this glamorous, but some like the Nikki character will think this was a great way to get famous and have the media attention they crave. Feeding the celebrity industry is a bad idea.
ReplyDeleteI love that The Bling Ring was not an indictment of the celebrity industry though. Any film could come down hard and judge all involved here, but kudos to Coppola for stepping back and just showing us what happened. There is a bit of satire and mocking involved (especially with Nikki) but I think it neither indulges or shuns what went on.
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