Taylor Swift: Miss Americana
Premise - A documentary on the life and career of pop superstar, Taylor Swift. More specifically, the documentary focuses on her public persona as a "nice girl" in Hollywood and the sociopolitical restraints that holds, with a celebration of her journey into a strong woman who will not stay silent.
Review - I have been going through a real Taylor Swift phase recently. With both folklore and evermore being released back to back in 2020, and my obsession with the folklore long pond studio sessions, I have been pretty aggressively revisiting my obsession with Taylor Swift's music. But the obsession is just that - the music. I can list about 100 Taylor Swift songs off the top of my head that I know and love. If I get a playlist going, it'll last for days. When it comes down to the woman behind the music, however, she is not a celebrity I know all too much about personally.
This differs from other celebrities (mostly actors, not musicians), for which I follow their lives rigorously, watching interviews and behind-the-scenes content. folklore's studio sessions were my first exposure in a long time into seeing Taylor Swift as a person, and I fell in love with that, which inspired me to watch this documentary.
Of course I was excited to hear the music from over the years! She has over a decade's worth of songs, many of which there are clips of her performing on stage, or within a music video, throughout the documentary. But what I found most valuable was her commentary on personal life experiences.
She feels very real in this documentary - down-to-earth, flawed, human, and most importantly, AFFECTED by the way people view her. She's viewed as some sort of doll or trophy, and people take pleasure in finding her "annoying" because she's "too perfect" or "fake." In these clips, we see her in sweats, cooking dinner, hanging out with friends, painting nails - being a person. We also see those larger-than-life moments where she's on stage or being mobbed by paparazzi and fans, and gain better insight into what that actually feels like with the constant reminder that this is a human being.
I do imagine there is SO much about her life that is entirely unrelatable, despite how relatable they try to portray her. The money alone makes it so difficult to feel as though she understands the struggles of the majority. But everyone only has their own perspective, that's not unique to her. Like all of us, we actively try to imagine what it's like in one another's shoes. I love to see her political involvement as she gets passionate about women's rights, LGBTQ rights, etc.
I get a bit obsessive about the fascinations of celebrity culture and breaking down those illusions. It's a trope I really enjoy. It's also incredibly sociopolitical, of course, to break down illusions of womanhood, "nice women", passive women - apolitical women. As a real person, Taylor Swift has real opinions and a real voice. (89/100)
Quote - "I want to wear pink and tell you how I feel about politics. And I don’t think that those things have to cancel each other out".
What to watch for - I looooove seeing the behind the scenes for the songwriting process, because what struck me most was how quickly these songs come together! Of course that's vastly influenced by the editing, but still - the songwriting process is a mystery to me as I think I lack the creative power to come up with melodies. I loved hearing the songs in their intermediate phases.
If you liked this documentary, I'd recommend folklore: the long pond studio sessions!
Directed by Lana Wilson
Distributed by Netflix
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