Priscilla – Review
113 Minutes, Rated R
Written and Directed by Sophia Coppola
**NOTE: this post will be updated with audio once we actually have the chance to talk about it. Until then, you can read Mark’s review below. Remember, though, you can listen to all our discussions of this and every other movie directly over on ACAST. Stay tuned.**
Synopsis:
When teenage Priscilla Beaulieu meets Elvis Presley at a party, the man who is already a meteoric rock-and-roll superstar becomes someone entirely unexpected in private moments: a thrilling crush, an ally in loneliness, a gentle best friend. Through Priscilla’s eyes, Sofia Coppola tells the unseen side of a great American myth in Elvis and Priscilla’s long courtship and turbulent marriage, from a German army base to his dream-world estate at Graceland, in this deeply felt and ravishingly detailed portrait of love, fantasy, and fame.
I’m not sure how I feel about this one. I grew up in a household that loved two topics: JFK and Elvis.
It’s no secret that I enjoyed the hell out of last year’s Baz Luhrman look in to the life of Elvis.
Loved it.
This year, we get the flip side of that coin with Priscilla, the biopic based on the book by (and executive produced by) Priscilla Presley.
First things first: it’s no secret that most (auto)biographies tend to shine things up a bit. Nobody likes to air all their dirty laundry. Even in those times when something scandalous or negative or even hateful does come out, you can usually count on there being more beyond that.
Now, when it comes to Priscilla Presley, her life has been analyzed since the moment she married Elvis, more than perhaps any other bride of the time except Jackie Kennedy.
All this leads me to say that Priscilla is… okay. It’s fine, I guess. It plays like carefully selected vignettes of her life from meeting Elvis to her leaving him, which are then painstakingly curated into bit-sized chunks by writer/director Sophia Coppola and approved by Priscilla herself.
On the plus side, she’s portrayed by Cailee Spaeny, whom I absolutely love. But — in my humble opinion — she’s not given a lot to work with. Wandering aimlessly around her parents’ house in Germany. Wandering aimlessly around Graceland before she’s married and Elvis is on tour… it’s just boring stuff.
I get that we are supposed to feel that she’s isolated no matter where she is. She’s ripped from life in the US and taken to Germany: death for a teenage girl. She’s isolated at Graceland. Even when she’s with Elvis, he’s often not really “there” in any meaningful way.
I get that this is supposed to be compelling, character-defining stuff…
But it doesn’t play that way. It’s. Just. Boring.
Is there truly negative stuff here? Sure. Elvis is portrayed as an emotional and psychological abuser. He manipulated her and her family to get what he wanted… which was Priscilla.
Speaking of Elvis, after Austin Butler nailed that role last year, it was nice that this Elvis doesn’t have to sing. It’s not, after all, his story, but hers.
But I’m not sold on the performance of Jacob Elordi as The King. Perhaps it’s because we mostly see him in those moments where he is leaving for something or departing again, leaving Priscilla on her own. he is as isolated from us as he is from Priscilla.
And (this is my opinion, mind you) Priscilla, for all her real-life and narrative claims, is never going to convince me that Elvis never slept with her when she was underage. I just don’t buy it. Even in this telling, they get to that point and then Elvis pulls back.
Elvis. Pulls. Back.
While simultaneously abusing her at every turn. Either this is untrue or he’s the most masterful manipulator ever.
Priscilla would probably claim the latter.
All I can say is that I found the film version of Priscilla disappointing. And I wanted to like it. It’s got an A24 label on it. It looks like it should be an A24 film…
Disappointing.
Damn it.
Priscilla hits select theaters November 3 and stars Cailee Spaeny, Jacob Elordi, Ari Cohen, Tim Post, and Dagmara Dominczyk.
And remember, if the BEST thing you can say about a movie is that it’s “visually stunning,” then they’ve done something wrong.
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