Maps to the StarsTo quote Carl Sagan, "If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe." For David Cronenberg--as is the case for his cerebral satire of Hollywood and vice, the same principle applies. And just as you may be scratching your head trying to connect that analogy, so too is Maps to the Stars cryptic in its message about the nature of Hollywood self-obsession, glamour addiction, all-consuming corruption and that great train wreck, that head-on collision of lofty ambition and shattered dreams. In this ruinous husk of the soul, this throbbing heart of the west coast is a widening gyre, bleeding out and sucking you in.
|
|
The story of Maps to the Stars is tripartite, following the young Agatha Weiss (Mia Wasikowska), a seemingly starstruck emigre from Florida to the land of movie magic, who hires the relatively down-to-earth limo driver (although it's not a stretch limo like Agatha wanted), Jerome Fontana (Robert Pattinson), to escort her around and revisit an obscure site where once stood a house, long since burnt to ash. We also have Benjie Weiss (Evan Bird), a young, "Bieber-esque"...wow, never thought I'd use that turn of phrase...rich actor brat, fresh out of rehab and on the eve of making the sequel to his multi-million hit, and a celluloid avatar for his parents, Cristina Weiss (Olivia Williams) and Dr. Stafford Weiss (John Cusack). And, ready for her close-up, Mr. DeMille, is Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore), who desperately clutches her youth, manically pursues her compulsion to act in a remake of a film which her late mother starred in before. The vestige of "Stolen Waters" clings to the psyches of the characters in Maps to the Stars like a kind of collective unconsciousness, or a plague which spreads and influences the characters in varying degrees. The three stories begin to braid together once the connections are set into place--you may have noticed a similarity in some of the characters' last names--and over time, they overlap like a tabloid, running over into one another, all tangent to the microcosm of Hollywood as well as the inescapable presence of fire and manifestations of the dead. Some back story to the reason that "Stolen Waters" has such a persistent hold on the lives of all is that it is implied that the themes, story, script, characters, and even the events surrounding the accidental death of the star, Clarice Taggart (Sarah Gadon), all resurface and stain the lives of these characters, who are bound in some way to this movie and its legacy. A line of cryptic dialogue which Clarice's character utters in a "clip" from the film is revisited by Agatha and Benjie both, like a sutra which gives power to them and holds it over them both. Although Agatha talks about her visitations from the dead, we actually witness Benjie's reunion with a girl who lost her battle with a terminal disease and Havana's visit from her dead mother--who appears younger than her--to cajole and deride her...given Havana's mania, it might just be in her head in this case, although it seems awfully cognizant for a figment of the imagination.
It's one thing to describe a movie as "cerebral", but this is an descriptor which can get thrown about to categorize a movie which escapes the comforts of easy analysis. But Cronenberg has made a cerebral satire, because it does criticize Hollywood in a way which is more nuanced and complex than simply throwing us a bunch of exaggerated stereotypes and expecting us to swallow the two-dimensional. Even when characters are stereotypes, they grow to defy classification because of our exposure to them and our broadening understanding of the superficial world in which they live. One of the best chortles I got from the film involved a cameo by Carrie Fisher (playing herself), who confesses to Havana that she finds it thrilling for her to get the chance to play her mother. Havana Segrand is the quintessential aging starlet, weathered by time and hard living, who she retreats into her full-body therapy sessions with Dr. Stafford--shrink to the stars--and apes at yoga meditations, body rubs, and obscene shopping sprees. She resembles a kind of cross between Norma Desmond and Brittany Spears, wearing Nicole Kidman's shed skin. At times, we are forced to sympathize with the silicone crone, but these emotions quickly get jettisoned as we discover just how much of a moral vacuum she really is. Conversely, while we never fully trust Agatha, giving off a "Single White Female" vibe and lying frequently--with potentially villainous burn marks--it becomes a challenge not to empathize with the discarded daughter, the odd, sweet creature she is. And Benjie is bound to the most unlikable of roles; he is a raging jerk. He does, however, remain strangely one of the more world-worn characters, pragmatic and straightforward, qualities desperately lacking in this California dreamscape. In a way, Maps to the Stars is not so much about Hollywood as it is about what Hollywood is and does, since so much of what has come to pass--the fires, the incest, the rituals--comes from that strange film we never really get to see, that "Stolen Waters", which has indeed stolen the agency of these characters, pulling their strings. In effect, they are living some semblance, some puppetry of that film in their own lives, a kind of silver screen god which on the sixth day, set forth upon the land of Los Angeles men and women to worship it. Our ways of life come to us through the television, the gospel of the cathode ray (sound familiar?), and our hymns are the quotes we recall, the lines of dialogue which we repeat as the new poetry. It's our evangel--this Mecca, this Hollywood...as American as homemade apple pie.
Recommended for: Fans of an acerbic romp through the Hollywood Hills, where the secrets which kill are also all that we have. And stare not into the film projector, for the projector stares also.
It's one thing to describe a movie as "cerebral", but this is an descriptor which can get thrown about to categorize a movie which escapes the comforts of easy analysis. But Cronenberg has made a cerebral satire, because it does criticize Hollywood in a way which is more nuanced and complex than simply throwing us a bunch of exaggerated stereotypes and expecting us to swallow the two-dimensional. Even when characters are stereotypes, they grow to defy classification because of our exposure to them and our broadening understanding of the superficial world in which they live. One of the best chortles I got from the film involved a cameo by Carrie Fisher (playing herself), who confesses to Havana that she finds it thrilling for her to get the chance to play her mother. Havana Segrand is the quintessential aging starlet, weathered by time and hard living, who she retreats into her full-body therapy sessions with Dr. Stafford--shrink to the stars--and apes at yoga meditations, body rubs, and obscene shopping sprees. She resembles a kind of cross between Norma Desmond and Brittany Spears, wearing Nicole Kidman's shed skin. At times, we are forced to sympathize with the silicone crone, but these emotions quickly get jettisoned as we discover just how much of a moral vacuum she really is. Conversely, while we never fully trust Agatha, giving off a "Single White Female" vibe and lying frequently--with potentially villainous burn marks--it becomes a challenge not to empathize with the discarded daughter, the odd, sweet creature she is. And Benjie is bound to the most unlikable of roles; he is a raging jerk. He does, however, remain strangely one of the more world-worn characters, pragmatic and straightforward, qualities desperately lacking in this California dreamscape. In a way, Maps to the Stars is not so much about Hollywood as it is about what Hollywood is and does, since so much of what has come to pass--the fires, the incest, the rituals--comes from that strange film we never really get to see, that "Stolen Waters", which has indeed stolen the agency of these characters, pulling their strings. In effect, they are living some semblance, some puppetry of that film in their own lives, a kind of silver screen god which on the sixth day, set forth upon the land of Los Angeles men and women to worship it. Our ways of life come to us through the television, the gospel of the cathode ray (sound familiar?), and our hymns are the quotes we recall, the lines of dialogue which we repeat as the new poetry. It's our evangel--this Mecca, this Hollywood...as American as homemade apple pie.
Recommended for: Fans of an acerbic romp through the Hollywood Hills, where the secrets which kill are also all that we have. And stare not into the film projector, for the projector stares also.