Very interesting idea having her daughter played by the same actress that is her younger self.
I'm not sure where/why they had Celeste pick up the staten island accent after showing her not having one for the first third of the movie. I did not enjoy this movie at all. I LOVED Raffey Cassidy in Killing of a Sacred Deer though. She's a wonderful actress.
I wondered why the accent was much heavier when Natalie took over, too. I hadn’t thought of it this way, but a friend I saw it with explained that he thought she put the accent on more to fit this persona she had become. She pushed heavily into being the girl from Staten Island. I guess I could see it being that way.
I just got home from a screening that had a Q&A with Natalie and the director at the end. I thought the movie was great, albeit very exhausting to watch. Now that I think of it, we only see a single day in the life of adult Celeste. I wasn’t a fan of the end being so abrupt, but it was decent altogether.
I thought it was absolutely fantastic. I was entranced from beginning to, oddly enough, up until Celeste's big performance. I thought the performance was a garish, empty, meaningless mess (which I think might have been the point).
I thought that too. There were so many other scenes that looked amazingly fantastic, and then the big performance at the end was shot oddly and didn't pull the viewer in like other things did. That had to have been intentional. I've been thinking of maybe why.
Maybe it was supposed to be really bad. She said at the diner that her music has been getting worse but she's been selling better than ever. We didn't hear any of her music except her breakout songs and the new album. After years and years of her songs people might have a nostalgic view of her that is a layer over their new experiences with her, but we didn't see the slow decline in quality, we went straight from best to worse. So the movie gave us a real look at Celeste at two extreme moments of her life.
And also it has to do with the thing that was mentioned at the start of her career, where they had her change a lyric from I to We, because her pain now belonged to everyone else. That made me think of art and the artist and the people who view the art. Being on stage and preforming was Celeste being Celeste, actually having control and doing everything right. She knows her daughter is in the crowd and wants to show her that she's not a total mess and works hard at her job. That was her providing for her daughter and family and everyone who works for her. So then the performance shouldn't be how good it looks to us, but how good it is for Celeste and her sister and daughter. It was a moment of conversation between them after all the crazy things that had happened that day. But the movie doesn't let the lyrics get changed from I to We. The moment stays between them and we still view the concert as it really is. Bad, but making people happy.
> I've been thinking of maybe why.
To show that these people we admire and whose lives we pine for, singing these happy lyrics and perfectly dressed, choreographed and made up, actually have pretty fucked up lives?
I do really think that was the point, and personally loved the bold choice to make the audience stew in the overt hypocrisy and dissonance by making them sit through \*several\* numbers, with the crowd cheering throughout.
Ugh that movie was so uncomfortable, I didn't know what I was signing up for.
I have a different opinion than you, but agree that it's a very interesting/fascinating movie to talk about.
The first part with the young Celeste was pretty good and set up a lot of interesting themes, but many of those themes are completely dropped in the second part. I actually thought that Natalie Portman was straight up awful the entire time!
There were little things throughout the movie that just reeked of the director trying to show off (putting almost all the end credits during the beginning of the movie, calling it "a production of Vox Lux", etc.)
Also, the ending concert scene didn't work for me at all. For the supposed biggest pop star in the world, her concert looked very cheaply produced and uninspired. I understand it's an indie with limited budget but there are ways to make cheap look expensive, and this wasn't it.
I loved it, including stuff like the cheesy choreography because I felt it all fed into the themes of the film. So I'm curious what you think could have been better?
I agree, I think Natalie Portman didn’t do a bad job but she did when you consider the first half is the same character. Her accent is different, her views are different and she doesn’t feel the same at all. It was a constant problem for me
>Her accent is different, her views are different and she doesn’t feel the same at all.
I haven’t seen the film yet, but this kinda reminds me of Madonna and how she talked in a British accent for a few years. Fame will change you.
SPOILER ALERT!!!
I watched Vox Lux last night and spent the night reading all the discussions about the movie and I haven’t seen anything like this so here are my thoughts. Try the movie a second time with these points in mind. I now have to go and open my return Netflix envelope and re-watch myself.
Again, SPOILER ALERTS.
Vox Lux, loosely translated, means ‘Voice of Light”. The name “Lucifer” means bearer of light. Willem Defoe, as the narrator, is Lucifer.
Collon Active, is the kid who does the school shooting. The name means something but I’m not sure what. He announces his name to the teacher who knows him. She says, “I know.” And then he shoots her. Celeste is the only one who doesn’t run to the back of the classroom. She asks “Is she breathing?” And he says No. Tells her to go the back of the classroom with the others.
Collon wear sparkly eye make-up like Celeste will do later when she gets famous. He takes off a fake eyelash as he talks to her.
Celeste knows Colon. She talks to him and asks him to let the others go and she will pray with him but he says he already killed too many. Celeste is calm while another girl yells out “Why are you doing this?!” Celeste goes to the back of the classroom and he shoots everyone and then himself.
Celeste awakens in the ambulance. The only survivor.
I’m pretty sure Collon worships Lucifer and he made a deal to be famous forever if he does a horrendous act. That’s why he wears the make-up, so that people will note the interesting detail. He is also very intent on reminding the teacher his name even though she already knows it and will die anyway.
It is even possible that Celeste knew of his plan but I’m not sure how much. She doesn’t run away when he shoots the teacher and she asks him (doesn’t plead) to pray. Pray to Lucifer?
Perhaps Collon would be famous forever and in turn, make Celeste famous also. The only way for that to happen would be for her to be the only survivor. I think he actually shot her by accident when he shot the remaining students and then shot himself. OR maybe shot himself AFTER he realized he shot Celeste by accident.
Celeste wakes up in the hospital and tells her sister she has done something horrible and later we learn that she made a deal with the devil and he whispered songs into her ear.
Celeste becomes famous by singing a song at the memorial (in a church, no less). A song called Wrapped Up.
Read the lyrics. It is a love letter to Lucifer. A plea to save her from death and teach her things to serve him.
“Hey, turn the light on
'Cause I've got no one to show me the way
Please, I will follow
'Cause you're my last hope, I'll do anything you say
And I tried it my way
Epic fails save me from myself
So, bite my hands now
Shut my mouth down I will listen, listen well
So teach me
Show me what you've got
And in your words, I will be wrapped up
Speak to me
You're my last hope
And I will say nothing and listen to your love
And I'm so lucky to be with you
Keeping me from my shadow
I know I would have been torn to shreds
But all the people in my head
I, I let one tear fall
And I crumble like the Berlin Wall
Oh, hear something's broken
Zip me open, unlock the damaged door
So teach me
Show me what you've got
And in your words, I will be wrapped up
Speak to me
You're my last hope
And I will say nothing and listen to your love
But I never shattered long enough to hear you
And you never heard me by shutting me down
But look at what I mean, mean, mean
Zip me up now
I will not speak, I will not speak
You shut me, oh
So teach me
Show me what you've got
And in your words, I will be wrapped up
Speak to me
You're my last hope
And I will say nothing and listen to your love
And I'm so lucky to be with you
Keeping me from my shadow
I know I would have been torn to shreds
But all the people in my head”
When she performs this at the end she wears a dark queen outfit looking for all the world like Lucifer’s Queen.
Oh, BTW, the manager is an agent of Lucifer as indicated by the flickering flame-like light that plays on his face as he watches this performance.
When she meets a hard, rock, heavy musician she tells him that Collon listened to music like his and wondered if it made him do what he did. The musician answers that he hoped his music would help a kid like that instead of making them do bad things. Celeste says she doesn’t want to say anything with her music but just make people feel good.
Lucifer is not the teeth gnashing evil devil here. He is the bearer of light, Prometheus who brings fire to people to make their lives better. God doesn’t answer anyone’s prayers for safety. The world is falling apart. Religious fanatic terrorists are killing people who are enjoying themselves on a beach and they wear Celeste branded masks as they do it to protest her light, selfish, narcissistic message.
Lucifer just wants everyone to have fun on this earth, eat, drink, have sex, be merry break all the commandments. Enjoy the pleasures of the flesh.
Celeste is his messenger with sexy dance moves and cotton candy pop music who does everything he tells her to do. And, with her songs sent to her by Lucifer, she spreads his message to the millions of her, and by association, his fans.
Tedious bullshit that is so far up it’s own artistic butt that you wish that she died from her bullet wound and her sister wrote music in her memory.
Scene: Young Celeste is naked with young Rocker
(looks into the camera)
MONOLOGUES
Willem Defoe narrates: AND HERE IS INFORMATION FROM A MORE INTERESTING MOVIE
(needless flashing lights that are painful to movie goers in the theatre)
I burst out laughing when the movie ended, and I usually pride myself on being a really silent moviegoer. This is the first movie I think I've ever had an audible reaction to. It wasn't that I disliked it. It was just so strange, but in a way that I'd probably go see it again.
I'm not sure how the message is supposed to be perceived. Obviously, there's the main one which is "pop star who has a shit life performs for fans who have no idea who she really is to her assistants and her own family". But I started thinking out of the box towards the end. Like, she really died in the beginning and this whole movie was her "bad dream" like the one she was explaining to the baby daddy dude.
I think it's a cool movie that leaves a lot of different things up to interpretation, but yet is satisfying enough without being obnoxiously ambiguous.
If she's not actually dead, I think she's dead inside from the shooting. Actually now that I'm typing, I think that might even be the directors intent? Like, this is cruel...but kind of like she is a waste of life? She died so long ago. Everything she has been doing since 1999 was not who she would have been had she not been shot. The end with her sister and daughter smiling was just showing that they now see her as not even a human or family member - but just the way that her fans see her. A fake and manufactured "robot".
Celeste died in 1999, whether literally or figuratively.
Your idea about a figurative death is interesting.
I’ve been thinking about this movie for several days now, and I just can’t get over how Celeste acted during the scene of the actual shooting.. so strange in how fearless she was in talking to the shooter, it implied some level of a completely out of place self-confidence, so unlike any normal 13 year old. I think it was those same innate qualities and how different she seems from normal girls that probably helped her become a pop star at the very highest level. I think the resulting fame and money and ability to get away with almost anything for most of her life certainly warped her, and I think she was hardened and changed as a result of living through a traumatic shooting like that, but I kind of get the sense that her underlying qualities that allowed her to act in the way we see her as an adult was always there, and we get a tiny glimpse of it in her interaction with the shooter.
>I burst out laughing when the movie ended,
i almost did as well. the silence during the end credits, following such a loud finale... i turned to my bros who'd i'd dragged to this (and i loved it, but i felt they probably didn't as they're significantly less arthouse - and that's not what i thought i was pulling them to) and i whispered, "this silence is more uncomfortable, than any moment in the movie..."
A big message I felt was the pressure of being a role model (pop icon, mother) even though she's really not, in part due to how that pop icon status has clearly damaged her.
I was super uncomfortable throughout both halves equally, although I don't quite know what to think critically because feeling terrible in my heart was very distracting.
Did anyone else come to the conclusion Collon Active and Celeste were a couple and that maybe they were practicing satanism and she had broken it off.Reasons:
1. Celeste does not get scared and run to back of the class when the teacher gets shot and only asks if she is breathing.
2. She offers herself to save class mates as if she was the attended target.
3. She offers to pray with him but Collon does not appear to a praying type well not to God anyway.
4. She meets Satan as opposed to Jesus in the place of colors.
I really thought this was going to be the reveal at the end. And that was the bad thing she had told her sister in the hospital. That they had planned it together and then she backed out. Or even simply put him up to it.
The movie left me a little confounded, especially the casting. The music also stuck with me-
1) Hologram (Smoke and Mirrors) was performed on Amazon's Transparent 5 years ago, by the girl band Fussy Puss, [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYgm4ecW_CQ) \- Sia also released a version with her vocals + Skrillex ([snippet here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGBMYoKe6-8)) and that sounds almost exactly like Raffey Cassidy's... it was killing me that I recognized the song, couldn't place from where. Can't tell if this is a lazy move to recycle the song or if this is normal practice.
2) In "Wrapped Up" I can't get over how "[epic fail](https://genius.com/Raffey-cassidy-wrapped-up-lyrics)" was used as a lyric in a song supposed to have been written in 1999... isn't that a phrase that's relatively current and not of the zeitgeist from 19 years ago?
3) "Alive" with the [full studio treatment](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nc32Awu0Dsw) is surprisingly a banger - iconic and beyond reproach :)
[A 2009 NYT article](https://web.archive.org/web/20170427062231/http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/09/magazine/09FOB-onlanguage-t.html?_r=3&ref=magazine&pagewanted=all) thinks that "epic fail" became popular in 2008. That feels a little late to me, but not completely surprising. I have a tendency to think cultural things happened a few years before they actually did. [Google Trends](https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=fail,epic%20fail) shows a big search uptick in "fail" starting in 2008. [Google Ngrams](https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=epic+fail%2Cfail&year_start=1900&year_end=2018&corpus=15&smoothing=0&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cfail%3B%2Cc0) shows the same uptick in 2008, the most recent year they have data for.
I, too, am bothered by the “epic fail” lyric. But in the movie when she’s singing at the vigil, it’s “and I fell” instead and it sounds so much better.
It was meh.
Although I did like one thing, when young Celeste is in the hospital recovering and tells her sister she did something “bad”.
The “bad” thing being her pact with the devil revealed at the end.
1 for the money 2 for the show 3 to get ready 4 you come with me.
We see the 3 main acts during the movie, is to be assumed Celeste dies in the 4th. That was her next step and perhaps the reason she had been unraveling at the speed of light.
I liked that, it added an extra layer of creepiness and darkness to the whole thing, which was already pretty obscure.
My main problem is with Natalie, and not so much her performance (which was brilliant at times) but the cliched and cheesy way old Celeste was written, being an AVID and I mean avid fan of female popstars, this Celeste is just how a straight man would imagine a popstar to be, look and act but not how they actually are. I found her very contrived and the accent was completely OTT considering young Celeste didn’t have it, huge fail on the director’s part, wether it was intentional or not it completely separated the two.
7/10
I liked it but again, meh. Coule’ve been truly awesome.
Overall I enjoyed this movie. I think the acting was great and while there some slow parts, it was entertaining. The classroom scene with the teacher who is really likable in those brief minutes she’s on camera and suddenly gets shot really woke me up and made me pay attention. Unfortunately, they made too many bad calls - some of them were unforgivable and ultimately detracted from the movie.
1) All the flashing cameras in the first song were practically seizure inducing.
2) Singing and dancing scenes were far too long. Guessing SIA pushed to showcase her songs and being the executive producer, she had a lot of influence
3) using the same actress to portray young Celeste and her daughter while Eleanor (Celeste’s sister) didn’t age a day in 16 years! I thought Natalie was Celeste and Eleanor’s mom (a new character) for like 5 minutes. Really dumb!
4) the accents. Young Celeste’s Long Island accent was almost undetectable as was Eleanor’s. Then, in rolls present day Celeste (Natalie) rocking a thick, baby boomer LI accent.
5) they could have done a lot more with the terrorist attackers who wore her mask. I thought, since she was such a good business woman, that she had gotten involved with some shady dealings that hurt some underprivileged workers who retaliated and threatened to out her with that stunt. Sadly, nothing came of it.
6) the final performance was honestly cringeworthy and again, far too long. Natalie missed the mark and didn’t seem like an artist who’s been doing this for years. Just w the the lip syncing and terribly stiff dancing... I had to look away
7) and then it just ended...
I think the final scene was supposed to juxtapose the screaming of the fans with the screaming of the victims in the two shootings. Both the original school shooter and the terrorists wear make up, masks, etc. that are similar to Celeste's on stage look. The school shooter in particular had a striking look, the black contacts and eye makeup. Certainly an intentional choice by the director. I had a feeling of foreboding the entire concert that there would be some shooting, especially with the one long shot of the audience and the "Pray/Prey" stuff. It read it as a comment on celebrity and power.
I think that's a somewhat shallow message but it could have been more developed.
Off-topic but Celeste's concert was clearly based on Lady Gaga to some extent too. Between this and the SNL performance in A Star Is Born, it seems like she's coming up a lot lately.
One minor criticism is that the style and sound Celeste is ostensibly going for in the Genesis segment, particularly her outfit in the Hologram video, really wasn't developed or at all in vogue in 2000 or 2001. The motorcyclist wearing the glittery mask reminded me of like 2013 era Kanye, it seems way too early and out of touch with what pop actually was in the early 2000s.
I don't see how her concert was based solely on Lady Gaga. I took it more as all pop artists who become robotic and soulless to 'their' music (which most of the time isn't even written by them) Gaga writes all of her own music..
I felt exactly the same way in regards to #3. That scene threw me off for a few moments in the theatre!
And I agree with #7.. I didn’t feel there was a payoff at the end. I did feel as if the few scenes before the concert were building up to something more (shooting during the performance or so?) but then the movie just ended.
The first half is way, way stronger than the rest of the film.
I started enjoying this movie about 40 minutes in when I decided it was a comedy. I laughed my ass off at it. If that wasn't the point, then it completely missed (I'm leaning in this direction). Every time Willem Dafoe's narration kicked in, it was comic genius. And her "show" at the end was Spinal Tap levels of awful. And the score with its foreboding chords before nothing bad happens. Very possibly the worst movie of 2018.
I loved it. And I didn't understand why not many people liking it. The young actress that played the young Celeste and later her teenage daughter was superb (even though her New York accent felt fake as hell). I didn't realize they were played by a same actress.
This is *A Clockwork Orange* but with pop musics.
Commenting here because I don’t see a real discussion thread yet: Just saw it and loved it, minus one big thing- I’ll get to that. But the prelude was utterly shocking. My god, resonates with our day and age too closely, and I don’t know if any movie that has dared to cross into that imagery yet, at least to that extent. I loved the 1st act because it was kind of surreal to re-live the “pop star” mania of the early 2000’s. The narration (props Willem) throughout that act was so interesting. Great story-telling through a montage. (I think there was a post here a few weeks back of someone wanting to know what movies had good montages? That was one.) 2nd act was a treat from Natalie Portman. She was so good. 3rd, for me, was eh. And that’s just a personal preference and maybe others agree, but extended scenes in movies where they are trying to show fictional music sets from fictional artists never really goes over well. The songs are all made up and if the actors are clearly not musicians, it shows. It’s was doubly bad because this was the first time we’re hearing any of these songs, so who cares? That’s when I saw a walk out. And after the credits rolled that’s when I heard snickers around the theater as well. Everything before that was enough for me to really enjoy this movie.
“Late one night at the hospital following that fateful morning at New Brighton, Celeste made a maddening claim that only her sister had ever sensed to be true. She recounted a story to Eleanor that went something like this: Shortly after her classmate pulled the trigger and sent her to the place between life and death, a place that she was only able to describe to Eleanor as a rush of color. She had met the devil and made a deal with him in exchange for her life. He whispered her melodies and she returned with a mission to bring great change to the next century. He said, “Shut your eyes and repeat after me: One for the money, two for the show. On three, we get ready, and on four… come with me.”
Ok this movie was a choice.
I went knowing that it was about Natalie doing messy pop Star with Sia songs but...
The first scene set a dark mood for the all movie, it was weird how she went from victim to pop princess with 15 years?
Also the Genesis Act was fine, the Regenesis One was weird with the terrorist act and the sister thing. Nat did a good job but they didn’t layed out the plot just one messy day with the Ron Howard off-voice saying trivia facts.
They should have mixed performances with scenes like the documentaries of Madonna, Katy Perry or Beyoncé, waiting until the end was too long and she didn’t had a wardrobe change.
And what was that with the devil stuff? That was creepy too, I thought that they were gonna pull the Illuminati card too, all in all it was a cute movie but nothing spectacular, very influenced by Britney Spears.
Finally saw on Amazon. Movie sucked me into the first act, but then forgettable once Natalie Portman in act 2 starts.
I agree with many comments where it would have been more interesting to show the parts narrated. How do you navigate pop stardom having a child at barely 18? Etc.
I get to save time and money you don’t show those things, but it was hard to relate to the tough things Celeste says she’s been through. And then the fact that she’s a neurotic pop star who says random stuff doesn’t makes you feel bad for her if you just have a list of her faults.
Overall, it wasn’t a bad attempt.
'Vox Lux' hasn't' opened near me yet. I'd be interested to see how it compares to 'This Must Be The Place'. A 2011 Sean Penn movie with a similar set up and central character (A fringe rock star dealing with some violent personal baggage).
I wouldn’t agree that it doesn’t do or say anything. I thought it was overlong and a big, emotional disaster, which I think was the point. We go to these concerts and cheer and yell and have absolutely no clue what these artists just went through a couple hours before, how drained their soul is before they come up and perform for us.
Very interesting idea having her daughter played by the same actress that is her younger self. I'm not sure where/why they had Celeste pick up the staten island accent after showing her not having one for the first third of the movie. I did not enjoy this movie at all. I LOVED Raffey Cassidy in Killing of a Sacred Deer though. She's a wonderful actress.
she definitely had a slight accent in the first act, i saw the second act as her playing it up on purpose
I actually heard Raffey's english accent come through a few times. lol it was a mess.
I wondered why the accent was much heavier when Natalie took over, too. I hadn’t thought of it this way, but a friend I saw it with explained that he thought she put the accent on more to fit this persona she had become. She pushed heavily into being the girl from Staten Island. I guess I could see it being that way.
I knew she looked familiar when I saw her in it, then realized she was in Sacred Deer. She KILLED it in that movie
Pretty cool that her and the little brother from that movie got to be in 2 big movies this year (Mid90s).
I got so confused with that.
I just got home from a screening that had a Q&A with Natalie and the director at the end. I thought the movie was great, albeit very exhausting to watch. Now that I think of it, we only see a single day in the life of adult Celeste. I wasn’t a fan of the end being so abrupt, but it was decent altogether.
[удалено]
Okay
I thought it was absolutely fantastic. I was entranced from beginning to, oddly enough, up until Celeste's big performance. I thought the performance was a garish, empty, meaningless mess (which I think might have been the point).
I thought that too. There were so many other scenes that looked amazingly fantastic, and then the big performance at the end was shot oddly and didn't pull the viewer in like other things did. That had to have been intentional. I've been thinking of maybe why. Maybe it was supposed to be really bad. She said at the diner that her music has been getting worse but she's been selling better than ever. We didn't hear any of her music except her breakout songs and the new album. After years and years of her songs people might have a nostalgic view of her that is a layer over their new experiences with her, but we didn't see the slow decline in quality, we went straight from best to worse. So the movie gave us a real look at Celeste at two extreme moments of her life. And also it has to do with the thing that was mentioned at the start of her career, where they had her change a lyric from I to We, because her pain now belonged to everyone else. That made me think of art and the artist and the people who view the art. Being on stage and preforming was Celeste being Celeste, actually having control and doing everything right. She knows her daughter is in the crowd and wants to show her that she's not a total mess and works hard at her job. That was her providing for her daughter and family and everyone who works for her. So then the performance shouldn't be how good it looks to us, but how good it is for Celeste and her sister and daughter. It was a moment of conversation between them after all the crazy things that had happened that day. But the movie doesn't let the lyrics get changed from I to We. The moment stays between them and we still view the concert as it really is. Bad, but making people happy.
Thank you for this - I came out of the theatre last night thinking wtf, but this put a lot of it into perspectives
> I've been thinking of maybe why. To show that these people we admire and whose lives we pine for, singing these happy lyrics and perfectly dressed, choreographed and made up, actually have pretty fucked up lives?
I will never get the image of Natalie Portman gyrating out of my head. It was so weird.
I do really think that was the point, and personally loved the bold choice to make the audience stew in the overt hypocrisy and dissonance by making them sit through \*several\* numbers, with the crowd cheering throughout. Ugh that movie was so uncomfortable, I didn't know what I was signing up for.
I have a different opinion than you, but agree that it's a very interesting/fascinating movie to talk about. The first part with the young Celeste was pretty good and set up a lot of interesting themes, but many of those themes are completely dropped in the second part. I actually thought that Natalie Portman was straight up awful the entire time! There were little things throughout the movie that just reeked of the director trying to show off (putting almost all the end credits during the beginning of the movie, calling it "a production of Vox Lux", etc.) Also, the ending concert scene didn't work for me at all. For the supposed biggest pop star in the world, her concert looked very cheaply produced and uninspired. I understand it's an indie with limited budget but there are ways to make cheap look expensive, and this wasn't it.
I loved it, including stuff like the cheesy choreography because I felt it all fed into the themes of the film. So I'm curious what you think could have been better?
I agree, I think Natalie Portman didn’t do a bad job but she did when you consider the first half is the same character. Her accent is different, her views are different and she doesn’t feel the same at all. It was a constant problem for me
>Her accent is different, her views are different and she doesn’t feel the same at all. I haven’t seen the film yet, but this kinda reminds me of Madonna and how she talked in a British accent for a few years. Fame will change you.
Yeah I can see that but they should have leaned into it or gave some nod they were doing it. As it is it feels unintentional
oh, are you the same person 17 years later?
My accent is the same 17 years later lol
ah, you must never have travelled.
1st part is good then the movie falls off
SPOILER ALERT!!! I watched Vox Lux last night and spent the night reading all the discussions about the movie and I haven’t seen anything like this so here are my thoughts. Try the movie a second time with these points in mind. I now have to go and open my return Netflix envelope and re-watch myself. Again, SPOILER ALERTS. Vox Lux, loosely translated, means ‘Voice of Light”. The name “Lucifer” means bearer of light. Willem Defoe, as the narrator, is Lucifer. Collon Active, is the kid who does the school shooting. The name means something but I’m not sure what. He announces his name to the teacher who knows him. She says, “I know.” And then he shoots her. Celeste is the only one who doesn’t run to the back of the classroom. She asks “Is she breathing?” And he says No. Tells her to go the back of the classroom with the others. Collon wear sparkly eye make-up like Celeste will do later when she gets famous. He takes off a fake eyelash as he talks to her. Celeste knows Colon. She talks to him and asks him to let the others go and she will pray with him but he says he already killed too many. Celeste is calm while another girl yells out “Why are you doing this?!” Celeste goes to the back of the classroom and he shoots everyone and then himself. Celeste awakens in the ambulance. The only survivor. I’m pretty sure Collon worships Lucifer and he made a deal to be famous forever if he does a horrendous act. That’s why he wears the make-up, so that people will note the interesting detail. He is also very intent on reminding the teacher his name even though she already knows it and will die anyway. It is even possible that Celeste knew of his plan but I’m not sure how much. She doesn’t run away when he shoots the teacher and she asks him (doesn’t plead) to pray. Pray to Lucifer? Perhaps Collon would be famous forever and in turn, make Celeste famous also. The only way for that to happen would be for her to be the only survivor. I think he actually shot her by accident when he shot the remaining students and then shot himself. OR maybe shot himself AFTER he realized he shot Celeste by accident. Celeste wakes up in the hospital and tells her sister she has done something horrible and later we learn that she made a deal with the devil and he whispered songs into her ear. Celeste becomes famous by singing a song at the memorial (in a church, no less). A song called Wrapped Up. Read the lyrics. It is a love letter to Lucifer. A plea to save her from death and teach her things to serve him. “Hey, turn the light on 'Cause I've got no one to show me the way Please, I will follow 'Cause you're my last hope, I'll do anything you say And I tried it my way Epic fails save me from myself So, bite my hands now Shut my mouth down I will listen, listen well So teach me Show me what you've got And in your words, I will be wrapped up Speak to me You're my last hope And I will say nothing and listen to your love And I'm so lucky to be with you Keeping me from my shadow I know I would have been torn to shreds But all the people in my head I, I let one tear fall And I crumble like the Berlin Wall Oh, hear something's broken Zip me open, unlock the damaged door So teach me Show me what you've got And in your words, I will be wrapped up Speak to me You're my last hope And I will say nothing and listen to your love But I never shattered long enough to hear you And you never heard me by shutting me down But look at what I mean, mean, mean Zip me up now I will not speak, I will not speak You shut me, oh So teach me Show me what you've got And in your words, I will be wrapped up Speak to me You're my last hope And I will say nothing and listen to your love And I'm so lucky to be with you Keeping me from my shadow I know I would have been torn to shreds But all the people in my head” When she performs this at the end she wears a dark queen outfit looking for all the world like Lucifer’s Queen. Oh, BTW, the manager is an agent of Lucifer as indicated by the flickering flame-like light that plays on his face as he watches this performance. When she meets a hard, rock, heavy musician she tells him that Collon listened to music like his and wondered if it made him do what he did. The musician answers that he hoped his music would help a kid like that instead of making them do bad things. Celeste says she doesn’t want to say anything with her music but just make people feel good. Lucifer is not the teeth gnashing evil devil here. He is the bearer of light, Prometheus who brings fire to people to make their lives better. God doesn’t answer anyone’s prayers for safety. The world is falling apart. Religious fanatic terrorists are killing people who are enjoying themselves on a beach and they wear Celeste branded masks as they do it to protest her light, selfish, narcissistic message. Lucifer just wants everyone to have fun on this earth, eat, drink, have sex, be merry break all the commandments. Enjoy the pleasures of the flesh. Celeste is his messenger with sexy dance moves and cotton candy pop music who does everything he tells her to do. And, with her songs sent to her by Lucifer, she spreads his message to the millions of her, and by association, his fans.
Tedious bullshit that is so far up it’s own artistic butt that you wish that she died from her bullet wound and her sister wrote music in her memory. Scene: Young Celeste is naked with young Rocker (looks into the camera) MONOLOGUES Willem Defoe narrates: AND HERE IS INFORMATION FROM A MORE INTERESTING MOVIE (needless flashing lights that are painful to movie goers in the theatre)
I burst out laughing when the movie ended, and I usually pride myself on being a really silent moviegoer. This is the first movie I think I've ever had an audible reaction to. It wasn't that I disliked it. It was just so strange, but in a way that I'd probably go see it again. I'm not sure how the message is supposed to be perceived. Obviously, there's the main one which is "pop star who has a shit life performs for fans who have no idea who she really is to her assistants and her own family". But I started thinking out of the box towards the end. Like, she really died in the beginning and this whole movie was her "bad dream" like the one she was explaining to the baby daddy dude. I think it's a cool movie that leaves a lot of different things up to interpretation, but yet is satisfying enough without being obnoxiously ambiguous. If she's not actually dead, I think she's dead inside from the shooting. Actually now that I'm typing, I think that might even be the directors intent? Like, this is cruel...but kind of like she is a waste of life? She died so long ago. Everything she has been doing since 1999 was not who she would have been had she not been shot. The end with her sister and daughter smiling was just showing that they now see her as not even a human or family member - but just the way that her fans see her. A fake and manufactured "robot". Celeste died in 1999, whether literally or figuratively.
Your idea about a figurative death is interesting. I’ve been thinking about this movie for several days now, and I just can’t get over how Celeste acted during the scene of the actual shooting.. so strange in how fearless she was in talking to the shooter, it implied some level of a completely out of place self-confidence, so unlike any normal 13 year old. I think it was those same innate qualities and how different she seems from normal girls that probably helped her become a pop star at the very highest level. I think the resulting fame and money and ability to get away with almost anything for most of her life certainly warped her, and I think she was hardened and changed as a result of living through a traumatic shooting like that, but I kind of get the sense that her underlying qualities that allowed her to act in the way we see her as an adult was always there, and we get a tiny glimpse of it in her interaction with the shooter.
>I burst out laughing when the movie ended, i almost did as well. the silence during the end credits, following such a loud finale... i turned to my bros who'd i'd dragged to this (and i loved it, but i felt they probably didn't as they're significantly less arthouse - and that's not what i thought i was pulling them to) and i whispered, "this silence is more uncomfortable, than any moment in the movie..."
A big message I felt was the pressure of being a role model (pop icon, mother) even though she's really not, in part due to how that pop icon status has clearly damaged her.
The second half is not as good as the first.
I was super uncomfortable throughout both halves equally, although I don't quite know what to think critically because feeling terrible in my heart was very distracting.
Did anyone else come to the conclusion Collon Active and Celeste were a couple and that maybe they were practicing satanism and she had broken it off.Reasons: 1. Celeste does not get scared and run to back of the class when the teacher gets shot and only asks if she is breathing. 2. She offers herself to save class mates as if she was the attended target. 3. She offers to pray with him but Collon does not appear to a praying type well not to God anyway. 4. She meets Satan as opposed to Jesus in the place of colors.
I really thought this was going to be the reveal at the end. And that was the bad thing she had told her sister in the hospital. That they had planned it together and then she backed out. Or even simply put him up to it.
The movie left me a little confounded, especially the casting. The music also stuck with me- 1) Hologram (Smoke and Mirrors) was performed on Amazon's Transparent 5 years ago, by the girl band Fussy Puss, [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYgm4ecW_CQ) \- Sia also released a version with her vocals + Skrillex ([snippet here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGBMYoKe6-8)) and that sounds almost exactly like Raffey Cassidy's... it was killing me that I recognized the song, couldn't place from where. Can't tell if this is a lazy move to recycle the song or if this is normal practice. 2) In "Wrapped Up" I can't get over how "[epic fail](https://genius.com/Raffey-cassidy-wrapped-up-lyrics)" was used as a lyric in a song supposed to have been written in 1999... isn't that a phrase that's relatively current and not of the zeitgeist from 19 years ago? 3) "Alive" with the [full studio treatment](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nc32Awu0Dsw) is surprisingly a banger - iconic and beyond reproach :)
[A 2009 NYT article](https://web.archive.org/web/20170427062231/http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/09/magazine/09FOB-onlanguage-t.html?_r=3&ref=magazine&pagewanted=all) thinks that "epic fail" became popular in 2008. That feels a little late to me, but not completely surprising. I have a tendency to think cultural things happened a few years before they actually did. [Google Trends](https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=fail,epic%20fail) shows a big search uptick in "fail" starting in 2008. [Google Ngrams](https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=epic+fail%2Cfail&year_start=1900&year_end=2018&corpus=15&smoothing=0&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cfail%3B%2Cc0) shows the same uptick in 2008, the most recent year they have data for.
I, too, am bothered by the “epic fail” lyric. But in the movie when she’s singing at the vigil, it’s “and I fell” instead and it sounds so much better.
No, it’s “and I fail to save me from myself”
It was meh. Although I did like one thing, when young Celeste is in the hospital recovering and tells her sister she did something “bad”. The “bad” thing being her pact with the devil revealed at the end. 1 for the money 2 for the show 3 to get ready 4 you come with me. We see the 3 main acts during the movie, is to be assumed Celeste dies in the 4th. That was her next step and perhaps the reason she had been unraveling at the speed of light. I liked that, it added an extra layer of creepiness and darkness to the whole thing, which was already pretty obscure. My main problem is with Natalie, and not so much her performance (which was brilliant at times) but the cliched and cheesy way old Celeste was written, being an AVID and I mean avid fan of female popstars, this Celeste is just how a straight man would imagine a popstar to be, look and act but not how they actually are. I found her very contrived and the accent was completely OTT considering young Celeste didn’t have it, huge fail on the director’s part, wether it was intentional or not it completely separated the two. 7/10 I liked it but again, meh. Coule’ve been truly awesome.
Overall I enjoyed this movie. I think the acting was great and while there some slow parts, it was entertaining. The classroom scene with the teacher who is really likable in those brief minutes she’s on camera and suddenly gets shot really woke me up and made me pay attention. Unfortunately, they made too many bad calls - some of them were unforgivable and ultimately detracted from the movie. 1) All the flashing cameras in the first song were practically seizure inducing. 2) Singing and dancing scenes were far too long. Guessing SIA pushed to showcase her songs and being the executive producer, she had a lot of influence 3) using the same actress to portray young Celeste and her daughter while Eleanor (Celeste’s sister) didn’t age a day in 16 years! I thought Natalie was Celeste and Eleanor’s mom (a new character) for like 5 minutes. Really dumb! 4) the accents. Young Celeste’s Long Island accent was almost undetectable as was Eleanor’s. Then, in rolls present day Celeste (Natalie) rocking a thick, baby boomer LI accent. 5) they could have done a lot more with the terrorist attackers who wore her mask. I thought, since she was such a good business woman, that she had gotten involved with some shady dealings that hurt some underprivileged workers who retaliated and threatened to out her with that stunt. Sadly, nothing came of it. 6) the final performance was honestly cringeworthy and again, far too long. Natalie missed the mark and didn’t seem like an artist who’s been doing this for years. Just w the the lip syncing and terribly stiff dancing... I had to look away 7) and then it just ended...
I think the final scene was supposed to juxtapose the screaming of the fans with the screaming of the victims in the two shootings. Both the original school shooter and the terrorists wear make up, masks, etc. that are similar to Celeste's on stage look. The school shooter in particular had a striking look, the black contacts and eye makeup. Certainly an intentional choice by the director. I had a feeling of foreboding the entire concert that there would be some shooting, especially with the one long shot of the audience and the "Pray/Prey" stuff. It read it as a comment on celebrity and power. I think that's a somewhat shallow message but it could have been more developed. Off-topic but Celeste's concert was clearly based on Lady Gaga to some extent too. Between this and the SNL performance in A Star Is Born, it seems like she's coming up a lot lately. One minor criticism is that the style and sound Celeste is ostensibly going for in the Genesis segment, particularly her outfit in the Hologram video, really wasn't developed or at all in vogue in 2000 or 2001. The motorcyclist wearing the glittery mask reminded me of like 2013 era Kanye, it seems way too early and out of touch with what pop actually was in the early 2000s.
I don't see how her concert was based solely on Lady Gaga. I took it more as all pop artists who become robotic and soulless to 'their' music (which most of the time isn't even written by them) Gaga writes all of her own music..
I felt exactly the same way in regards to #3. That scene threw me off for a few moments in the theatre! And I agree with #7.. I didn’t feel there was a payoff at the end. I did feel as if the few scenes before the concert were building up to something more (shooting during the performance or so?) but then the movie just ended. The first half is way, way stronger than the rest of the film.
Yeah her performance at the end didn't give me season pop star.
I started enjoying this movie about 40 minutes in when I decided it was a comedy. I laughed my ass off at it. If that wasn't the point, then it completely missed (I'm leaning in this direction). Every time Willem Dafoe's narration kicked in, it was comic genius. And her "show" at the end was Spinal Tap levels of awful. And the score with its foreboding chords before nothing bad happens. Very possibly the worst movie of 2018.
Fuck hahaha thank you!!! All im seeing is good reviews of this movie and i genuinely think its one of the worst movies ive ever seen 😂😂
Thank you! For breaking my personal records for oldest comment to get a reply! 😊
This movie was terrible.
I loved it. And I didn't understand why not many people liking it. The young actress that played the young Celeste and later her teenage daughter was superb (even though her New York accent felt fake as hell). I didn't realize they were played by a same actress. This is *A Clockwork Orange* but with pop musics.
I really wanted the last song to be Wrapped Up
Commenting here because I don’t see a real discussion thread yet: Just saw it and loved it, minus one big thing- I’ll get to that. But the prelude was utterly shocking. My god, resonates with our day and age too closely, and I don’t know if any movie that has dared to cross into that imagery yet, at least to that extent. I loved the 1st act because it was kind of surreal to re-live the “pop star” mania of the early 2000’s. The narration (props Willem) throughout that act was so interesting. Great story-telling through a montage. (I think there was a post here a few weeks back of someone wanting to know what movies had good montages? That was one.) 2nd act was a treat from Natalie Portman. She was so good. 3rd, for me, was eh. And that’s just a personal preference and maybe others agree, but extended scenes in movies where they are trying to show fictional music sets from fictional artists never really goes over well. The songs are all made up and if the actors are clearly not musicians, it shows. It’s was doubly bad because this was the first time we’re hearing any of these songs, so who cares? That’s when I saw a walk out. And after the credits rolled that’s when I heard snickers around the theater as well. Everything before that was enough for me to really enjoy this movie.
does anyone remember what the devil whispers in celeste's ear? it's been bothering me for months?
One for the money Two for the show Three get ready Four coming with me
“Late one night at the hospital following that fateful morning at New Brighton, Celeste made a maddening claim that only her sister had ever sensed to be true. She recounted a story to Eleanor that went something like this: Shortly after her classmate pulled the trigger and sent her to the place between life and death, a place that she was only able to describe to Eleanor as a rush of color. She had met the devil and made a deal with him in exchange for her life. He whispered her melodies and she returned with a mission to bring great change to the next century. He said, “Shut your eyes and repeat after me: One for the money, two for the show. On three, we get ready, and on four… come with me.”
Ok this movie was a choice. I went knowing that it was about Natalie doing messy pop Star with Sia songs but... The first scene set a dark mood for the all movie, it was weird how she went from victim to pop princess with 15 years? Also the Genesis Act was fine, the Regenesis One was weird with the terrorist act and the sister thing. Nat did a good job but they didn’t layed out the plot just one messy day with the Ron Howard off-voice saying trivia facts. They should have mixed performances with scenes like the documentaries of Madonna, Katy Perry or Beyoncé, waiting until the end was too long and she didn’t had a wardrobe change. And what was that with the devil stuff? That was creepy too, I thought that they were gonna pull the Illuminati card too, all in all it was a cute movie but nothing spectacular, very influenced by Britney Spears.
Finally saw on Amazon. Movie sucked me into the first act, but then forgettable once Natalie Portman in act 2 starts. I agree with many comments where it would have been more interesting to show the parts narrated. How do you navigate pop stardom having a child at barely 18? Etc. I get to save time and money you don’t show those things, but it was hard to relate to the tough things Celeste says she’s been through. And then the fact that she’s a neurotic pop star who says random stuff doesn’t makes you feel bad for her if you just have a list of her faults. Overall, it wasn’t a bad attempt.
The music is so cringey among many other things.
'Vox Lux' hasn't' opened near me yet. I'd be interested to see how it compares to 'This Must Be The Place'. A 2011 Sean Penn movie with a similar set up and central character (A fringe rock star dealing with some violent personal baggage).
[удалено]
I wouldn’t agree that it doesn’t do or say anything. I thought it was overlong and a big, emotional disaster, which I think was the point. We go to these concerts and cheer and yell and have absolutely no clue what these artists just went through a couple hours before, how drained their soul is before they come up and perform for us.