When I heard that yet another remake of A Star Is Born was going to be released in theaters, I resolved to watch all of the movies in one sitting at home and not pay to see it in theaters. It is probably going to get remade at least one more time in my lifetime and long after I’m dead. I knew that the third remake did not need my money because people would flock to see Lady Gaga on the big screen, and every remake has received tons of professional accolades and praise from the general public. In addition, Bradley Cooper has been on a winning streak for quite some time so I figured that his directorial debut would be no different, and I was right. It is still in theaters months after it was initially released on October 5, 2018. Engaging in A Star Is Born marathon is not necessarily an easy feat. It is hard to accumulate all the movies—I had to get the first three from the library. Each movie is long, and I decided to watch them in chronological order, which means that I was not in optimal viewing condition for Cooper’s movie. I loved it in spite of the bag of rocks that I brought to the experience so it is probably even better than I think that it is.
A Star Is Born (2018) is the best one to date with George Cukor’s version only coming in second because the studio butchered his vision and literally destroyed some of the film. I’m convinced that Bradley Cooper watched each movie, took notes about what he thought was missing and what he wanted to keep then wrote the script. I actually agreed with the majority of his choices. He took Kris Kristofferson’s innate rock star swagger and hotness, but wisely toned down the attitude to a more country, humble persona, which would not ordinarily be a draw for me because I hate most country music. He also wisely retained the intimate Arizona retreat as their real home and turned up the sexual chemistry without being highly choreographed and highlighting awkwardness to make the attraction feel more organic. Only the original delves into one character’s origins, but Cooper decided to expand and examine the origins of the couple and actually shows how the couple’s respective families are incorporated in their professional and marital lives instead of leaving them at the bookends or omitting them altogether. He understands the pivotal emotional beats and the strengths of the story from the second movie and remains faithful to it in his version while updating it to our time, which means that the music is superb.
Cooper wisely gave his character more gradations in his descent and showed his character’s talent, which is usually told. My problem with most of the prior movies is that the older star is inconceivable as someone who was ever charming and had a strong career since we only see him as a complete lout except with one person, his love interest, but Cooper’s version is charming, gracious and patient. As he gets less functional due to his use of drugs and alcohol, the fallout becomes more plausible. Even when he is completely gonzo, his guitar playing upstages the singers. Also his moments of meanness are subtler (shout out to the gentler, but no less startling reference to The Public Enemy) and can occasionally be rationalized as a joke or a bad day so it seems less obvious that this chick needs to run and never look back. The symbols of fame were gloriously current and curt with no need to create extensive time-consuming montages. I’m not sure how it will age in the future (“What is YouTube, grandma?” “Who is Alec Baldwin? “Saturday Night Live was on THEN!?!”), but it works now.
It was a wise choice for Lady Gaga’s character to be more pugnacious and aggressive while simultaneously vulnerable and furtive, especially considering the way that she is introduced as someone who likes to perform in disguise, not as herself. I love Barbra Streisand, but her character was so ballsy that I didn’t understand how she could plausibly be with the guy for a few minutes, and when she pleads shyness, it never felt credible.
I didn’t know until after watching A Star Is Born (2018) that the struggle with drugs and alcohol was personal for Cooper so unlike all the prior actors, he isn’t worried about how playing a has been will affect his career, but embraces it. So unlike all the other movies that centralizes the guy’s story, but actually feels ambivalent and afraid of how the role will actually affect his career, Cooper sincerely goes there. Most of the other movies are critiques of either the movie or music industry, but this movie is more intimate. Usually A Star Is Born’s main character is the husband, the wife and the industry/public. The latter is more in the background, but never takes center stage. There is no strong producer and publicist as the fairy godmother or evil, older stepsister, but an afterthought producer and manager who lays down the law without any real stick to enforce it. His role is thin, more of a highlighter, the mean inner voice of his clients, but not innately impressive with the power to make or break them. The public is initially obtrusive, but there is no equivalent of the tearing away of the veil moment. There is less of a cannibalistic, horror movie quality to this version than any of its predecessors.
I suspect that when Cooper was making this movie, he called up his friends from Alias, had a crap ton of vocal and guitar training, and had a casting wishlist fairy, whose name was Cradley Booper, who charmed Lady Gaga. I didn’t know that Sam Elliot was in the movie and thought, “That isn’t Cooper’s usual voice. He sounds like Sam Elliot.” Then when I realized that he cast Elliot as his older brother, I gave the movie extra points for that alone. Where is Jon Lovitz to shout with a flourish, “Acting!” when you need him. I always loved that as a person, Cooper is clearly a film geek who enjoys watching movies as much if not more than he enjoys being in them, but now he has made me his fan. Cooper impressed me as a director, a writer and an actor.
A Star Is Born (2018) in contrast to its earlier movies rejects the need for a makeover. I was surprised that many reviewers agreed with Jackson’s view of Ally as a commercial sellout because she does change her image and dances. The seeds of the destruction of their relationship existed from the start because he missed a few casual, but character defining things that she says. She usually types her lyrics, not writes in a notebook, but because she is traveling, the notebook was better than forgetting the songs that she was writing. When he first meets her, maybe in part because she is in a drag bar, she is very comfortable with being an exhibitionist and sexually flirty, but begins to get shy under real scrutiny with a heterosexual man who is clearly interested because there could be actual consequences with someone who is unsuitable on paper. She used to perform with dyed hair and a sexy outfit before she met him. He may have shown her that she didn’t have to hide under an armor of makeup and hair or be afraid to be herself and sing her songs, but it only broadened her repertoire, not created it. The manager pushes her one-way, which she rejects, and her husband shows her another minimalist path, which she eagerly accepts, but ultimately she decides how to incorporate their ideas in her public persona. When she sees the photos of the image that she creates, a happy medium, she finally believes that she is beautiful and rejects anyone’s attempt to put her back in the ugly box. She’ll quit a job and dump a guy if he pushes her too far. I don’t see the manager as having control over her at all. When her husband makes the remark about sneaking one of his songs in her notebook, she is clearly considering ripping him a new one, but decides against it because he is just out of recovery.
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Is A Star Is Born an innately and eternally problematic film by nature of the story? Yes. It suggests that there can only be one star in a family, and if there is, and it is the wife, no matter how happy the husband is for her success, it is better for him to die, Stella Dallas style, and allow her to live her best professional life than to exist under the weight of ignominy or accept her largess without pulling his weight. In the end, she is just a symbol of his greatness and her accomplishments are his, not hers.
I’m surprised that no one seems to bring up a very crucial work life balance point raised in this version. In contrast to the other movies, she has no interest in sacrificing her career to take care of him, just curtailing the tour and finding a way to balance her personal and professional life. She wants to reciprocate what he did for her, which seemed fair albeit risky. Yes, it would mean less professional and financial success, but why is work success prioritized over personal success or finding a balance? I hate when women do anything to keep a man, but this movie was the first time that I found her response to the crisis moderate and reasonable instead of career suicide and a complete fulfillment of traditional gender roles, i.e. the woman as the caretaker with no career. Would it work? Probably not, but it was a reasonable response to a loved one going through a crisis.
There is still this problem of the male ego evaluating the situation and giving preeminence of her career over their relationship and his life. It is patriarchal to think that he knows better than she does regarding what she wants for her life. He may have always exhibited this behavior, but at least, he was giving her what she wanted before. She went from a journey of checking with him regarding business deals to stating exactly what she wants and being unwilling to compromise. Why is it so important for her to have the best career possible than a very solid career and a rocky, but ok personal life?
I’m not purposely ignoring the issues of addiction, mental disability, dealing with childhood abuse and/or neglect, self-medicating and addiction, which obviously plays a factor in his decision, but the way that the movie cosigns his decision as if he is a modern day Jesus dying solely because of his great devotion to his wife is really depressing. This isn’t self-sacrificial or a decision rooted in what is best for him. The first two movies use a confrontation with a publicist, a court appearance then Kate Chopin’s The Awakening ending so that it feels more like a liberating moment for the character as well as a self-sacrificial act for the wife. He no longer has to deal with thwarted ambition and doing his best, but still being seen as his old self; thus he is doomed to fail. The prior three leaves the wife with the impression that her husband was fine, but it is a tragic accident though she is left with some suspicions.
There is no ambiguity with this ending. It is self-condemning, hopeless and final, which makes it feel more realistic, but combined with the final song is the most disturbing ending for the wife. It is almost as if she is throwing herself personally on her husband’s pyre. She is no longer singing her songs and is just a professional person publicly executing her personal life out of devotion to him—“I’ll Never Love Again.” Yikes! She is young, and never is a long time. The only plus is that she still keeps her first name while adding his last in homage and as a way to keep him alive, but he is getting more in death than he would have gotten in life.
Once he no longer liked the songs that she was writing and realized that his time was up, he found a way to get the public to listen to him again! “If you don’t dig deep into your fuckin’ soul you won’t have legs. I’m just telling you that. If you don’t tell the truth out there you’re fucked. All you got is you and what you have to say to people and they are listening right now and they are not going to be listening forever. Trust me. So you gotta grab it and you don’t apologise or worry about why they’re listening or how long they’re gonna be listening for. You just tell them what you want to say.” I’m not necessarily saying that Jackson was consciously thinking like a body snatcher, but he took Noodles’ advice literally, “She’s a way out.” He thought her music didn’t have legs so he found a loophole to get people to listen to him again. He has her singing his songs and doing what he wants. She is singing his music the way that he wants her to sing it and will never leave him. “But having something to say and a way to say it so that people listen to it, that’s a whole other bag. And unless you get out and you try to do it, you’ll never know. That’s just the truth. And there’s one reason we’re supposed to be here is to say something so people want to hear. Don’t you understand what I’m trying to tell you?” He found another way to communicate to his audience. He stole her voice! And all along, I took him at face value that he wanted her to use her words, but sneaking his words into her book was a more insidious act than it felt at the moment. Imagine if someone inserted a page in your diary or journal.
For someone incredibly concerned with his message being communicated, I’m not sure what was so urgent about Jackson’s message other than he thought it reflected the reality of life, but there was no Never Look Away moment. As much as I adored the performances, I felt that the music’s strongest effect was to strongly connect two dissimilar people and create love and beauty, but there is never a moment where it feels as if that beautiful love had the power to change the world though it does generate a lot of revenue and public interest. Jackson’s words convey that level of importance for the artist, but his actual work does not have that affect on the world.
I adored A Star Is Born (2018) in spite of my issues with the ending and the dissonance between Jackson’s mission statement and actual work product. (A real radical and realistic ending would have been a mutual ending.) I’m probably going to buy the soundtrack. I now officially think Bradley Cooper is hot. I kind of want to watch it again.