Sadly, neither of the soundtrack’s halves provide much to sink one’s teeth into. Divorced from the screen, the Vox Lux soundtrack literally represents a split release between two of the pop machine’s most capable tinkerers and one of the most offbeat musicians of the last 40 years-a prospect as enticing as it is wholly representative of the film’s own thoughtless framework. For viewers looking to engage more fully with the music, there’s the soundtrack itself, which tacks on 10 instrumental score cues composed by legendary avant-garde figure Scott Walker (who also handled scoring on Corbet’s previous feature, the fascist-focused 2015 The Childhood of a Leader). Written and produced by Sia and ubiquitous pop guy Greg Kurstin (Adele, Halsey), most of the ten Cassidy-and-Portman-performed songs the duo composed for the film are jammed into subpar concert footage that closes out the film’s last 20 minutes. As target practice for the target-rich machinations of pop music itself, Vox Lux feels as forced as Portman’s Staten Island accent.Īmid these grasps for meaning, the clearest aspect of Vox Lux becomes its general disregard for the music itself. As a meditation about the daily horror of mass shootings in America and the accidental stardom that can accompany becoming the face of tragedy, it’s purely anachronistic the assertion that Celeste’s elegiac post-shooting song “Wrapped Up” could go viral in the early 2000s anticipates the normalcy of regular violence and instant fame in a way that betrays the pre-viral time period. Having said all that, this movie in my view is for certain type of people and I get that some enjoy it - to each their own.As young Celeste (Raffey Cassidy) survives an unbelievable tragedy that’s become all-too-believable while her older self (Natalie Portman) is trapped in a cycle of self-loathing and trauma, Vox Lux attempts to tilt at a few thematic windmills-the American culture of violence, how said culture intersects with pop iconography, the pressure we place on public figures to behave in a way that reflects our own assumed system of belief-without fully committing to any one beat. For me this was kind of movie I ended up watchin half way through and thinkin - will this be another of the movies I watch whole movie and think why didn't I switch it off earlier - so eventually I did skip through it and yeah, for me I felt good that I did not watch the latter part fully. But take that away and I think this for average viewer is not really that exciting. I think that people will for sure like it if they like Sia's music, or are interested in lifes of popstars and what not or like the actors playing it (acting is quite good in this anyway). For me personally it was too boring, even though it started out really intriguing and I get the idea of the movie, to show pop star's life from their side kinda and what they go trough and some extra stuffs to it, for me that was too boring, mainly because - not that much into these kind of movies and for me it got boring too often so I eventually just skipped through it (I did watch more than half of it). This is a typical movie that critics like but for audiences widely I think it will be dividing. Therefore that side of the story doesn't fall into a cheap romanticism of dreams and illusions of an artist who began at the bottom and then made it big, and that's perhaps the greatest strength of this story. Especially because Portman's character isn't someone devoted to her art but someone who doesn't have more than that because of the decisions she took for her life. But it manages to save itself and become more enjoyable because of the work of the actors and the music.Īs I said, Vox Lux doesn't come to re-invent anything but it does feel more sustantial than other films that deal with the same theme. After all a lot of films talking about the dark side of fame have already been done before.Īnd even if the comparison isn't the most fair, it can be said that this film has some reminiscence to Black Swan.īut this film isn't Black Swan and the narrative is not the most dynamic, especially because there are moments where it's inevitable to think this story is a bit overloaded with pretentiousness. Natalie Portman stars in this story that doesn't come to deliver an innovative story.
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