A shallow tale of superficial people
I absolutely loved Sofia Coppola’s ‘Lost in Translation’. The film was beautifully written, the romance was subtle and poignant and the characters of Murray and Johansson had enough depth in them to make you feel overwhelmed. Her latest flick The Bling Ring, however, is exactly opposite of what you have seen in ‘Lost in Translation’. The characters in this film are superficial, obnoxious and quite irritating; but that’s the film’s USP and what the film is all about.
Set in LA and based on actual events published in Vanity Fair magazine, the film is about a group of teenagers who obsess about celebrities and brands. They start tracking down the addresses of the celebrities and socialites and robbing their houses while they are out. The more they get away with it the more reckless they become.The nasty hobby slowly turns into a compulsion that completely ruins the lives of these high school teenagers.
The film kicks off with the tacky friendship between Marc Hall (Israel Broussard) who is a new student in California and Rebecca Ahn (Katie Chang) ata party in Rebecca’s house. Rebecca is a terribly snobby fashion obsessed teenager whose only pass time seems to be surfing the web or looking at magazines and make comments about the clothes and accessories of the high profile socialites and celebrities. They start off with checking unlocked vehicles in the neighborhood and shamelessly robbing cash and credit cards and then trespassing into a wealthy house where they steal handbag, cash and use a brand new Porsche to go to shops to spend the stolen cash. Marc and Rebecca meet another fame-obsessed gang in a night club: Nicki (Emma Watson), her sister Sam (Taissa Farmiga), and Chloe (Claire Julien).They form a (in) famous group named The Bling Ring.
This group of desperadoes adopts a fixed strategy; they search the web for the information about when a celebrity is likely to be out attending a party or on vacation. They then trespass into their house (avoiding the CCTV) and rob their valuables like cash, jewelry, footwear, bags, watches and much more. These celebrities include Kirsten Dunst, Paris Hilton, Audrina Patridge, Orlando Bloom and his girlfriend, Miranda Kerr. In all these heists they follow the same pattern and the same scenes are repeated multiple times. But in the mean time they get caught in a CCTV recording at Audrina Patridge’s house but their faces go unidentifiable. This incident gives them a boost instead of a scare and they kind of develop a feeling somewhere inside their hearts that they will never be caught and they keep going, more reckless than ever. But, eventually, following a thorough investigation, they get caught, prosecuted and have to serve jail term.
The Bling Ring is a kind of film that cannot be defined by a particular genre. Some might call it a Crime drama; while some others a Satire or Black comedy. If you are expecting some form of drama and a gripping climax, then this one is definitely not your cup of tea. This film has been shot in a different style giving it a kind of documentary look and I believe it was done on purpose since Sofia tried to keep it as much real as possible. So, the film never actually portrays the other side of the story, it doesn’t give a sneak peek into the psyche of the teenagers or what had been the driving factor behind their criminal minds. It’s just about the repeated actions of their crime and wrongful deeds of the teenagers and that’s where the film gets boring after a certain point of time and never recovers after that.
I don’t know about you, but I had some serious problems with two basic facts in the film. First of all, although the film was inspired by actual incidents, I never quite understood how it’s possible to break into the house of a celebrity so easily; which celebrity leaves a key under the door mat and it’s not just once or for one celebrity. The same incidents are repeated in the houses of all the celebrities and the entire thing looked a bit surreal and too tough to digest although I tried hard to keep in mind that these incidents actually happened.
Secondly, Sofia spent too much time on depicting the incidents which could have been crisply edited. There is an overuse of the same expressions and dialogues like “Wow” innumerable times in the film.
The Bling Ring is a well-acted film. Everyone plays their part perfectly while Emma Watson steals the show. Her expressions, her attitudes were top-notch. Look out for the final climax and the scenes where she gives an interview to the Vanity Fair in her house and she speaks about the spirituality and the burglaries. She is definitely the fresh young talent to watch out for. Katie Chang is also a delight to watch and she is the one who actually infuses that anger or irritation inside you with her daring snobby attitude and body language.
Overall The Bling Ring didn’t work for me not because it lacked drama but because everything was so superficial. It might have been able to make some noise as a successful indie film of 2013 but it never quite made me feel for the characters or their actions. It was a mere visual experience of some burglaries which they shamelessly boasted in their group of friends or social networking sites.
For me it was a film that shouldn’t have been made in the first place.!
Cinema Paradiso 