Tell Me Something Boy

Source: A Star Is Born (2018) (imdb.com)

For anyone who has been wanting me to review this, you've finally got your wish! For the past 2 days, I've been off work with a stomach bug (bleh!) and what do you do when you're ill and can't go into work - snuggle up and put on a film! (And have green tea on a drip!)

So after scouring Netflix etc etc, I decided this would be a chance to see one of the films that has been highly commended during the awards season, ending with the Oscars last weekend. I noticed this had FINALLY been released on iTunes, so 1 rent later and I was curled up with my brew watching A Star Is Born. And naturally, I wanted to tell you my thoughts about it

This is the 4th time this story has been adapted, originally in 1937, then 1954 starring Judy Garland and then 1976 with Barbara Streisand. This time, it stars Lady Gaga as well as Bradley Cooper - who also produced, co-wrote AND directed the film. I guess you can never have your fingers in enough pies... It also co-stars Sam Elliot and Anthony Ramos (who was in the original cast of Hamilton).
Can I also mention before going into the main event that the film pays a little homage to the Ghost of "A Star Is Born" Past by Gaga singing Over The Rainbow as the titles were appearing - which of course is THE song most people think of when the talk about Judy Garland.

Anyway, let's get into the 2018 version.

This adaptation follows the doomed romance between alcoholic country singer Jackson (Cooper) and struggling artist Ally (Gaga). As her star rises and Jackson gets more out of control, it explores how blurred the lines between professional and personal lives can be in the music industry - the kind of material Hollywood lap up.

And lap it up they did! It was nominated for 8 Oscars and won Best Original Song for Shallow (this year's This Is Me), had 7 BAFTA nominations plus a win for Music, 5 Golden Globe Award nominations plus a win for Original Song (again for Shallow, seems to be a pattern here), and won 2 out of its 4 Grammy nominations; and that's not even half of it, there's a whole Wikipedia page just for its honours!

Speaking of its music, as there seems to be a link between that and its accolades; I will admit, the songs are NOT as good as something like The Greatest Showman, but it is during the songs that the film would provide some of its best moments from Gaga's version of La Vie En Rose, to Always Remember Us This Way, and, of course, Shallow, showing how good Cooper and Gaga's vocals truly are. It is then that the cinematography would go all out and give out some amazing shots of audiences at their gigs clearly having the time of their lives!

But, while it has some good bits, there was a big problem I felt with the film - and that was it dragged A LOT. The first half started off well (really well in fact), but as it the story went along, the pace was often WAY too slow (for me anyway) and it meant that the film was WAY too long. Personally, about half an hour of material could have been cut. Also, the other thing that annoyed me a fair bit was that there was a lot of mumbling going on.

I don't want to particularly want to go too much further into this without giving too much away, so I'll next come to my recommendation.
I have to be honest, and say that it's probably a bit of a marmite film. You'd likely either love it or loathe it. I am probably the 0.0001% who aren't in either party, and would say "it was decent but...…"

If you've not seen it before and are not too sure whether it is for you, I would recommend what I did and rent it from iTunes or similar - it's only a couple of quid and then you won't have an extra DVD cluttering up your house or download taking up memory on your device if you don't like it.