The Bling Ring

Ever since "The Virgin Suicides," I've been a big fan of Sofia Coppola.  The world of cinema is filled with incredible auteurs and even some gifted journeyman directors.  It is strange, however, that so many of these people are men.  In fact, the vast majority of film directors have been male.  Women as the creative force behind the camera are woefully underrepresented.  I won't get into why that is.  It's a subject that has been tackled by far greater writers and thinkers than I, and yet no answer seems to completely explain the phenomenon.  Despite making critically acclaimed films, female directors seem to have their careers clouded by folks focusing on the fact that they made a movie while being a woman. (Kathryn Bigelow is especially susceptible to this as she tends to make action movies, a genre associated with men.)  But is Coppola's success due to her talent or the novelty of her gender in the world of film direction?

Coppola has more than proven herself able to stand among the great contemporary directors (an Oscar and a Golden Lion on her mantle).  As I said, I'm a big fan of hers but I, by no means, find her infallible.  I find her last film, "Somewhere," to be dull.  And I don't even like "The Virgin Suicides" very much (I was drawn more to the tone and style of the film).  But I love "Lost in Translation" and I think that "Marie Antoinette" is a hugely underrated film.  So with a 50-50 track record, where does Coppola's newest film, "The Bling Ring," stand?

It's pretty damn good.

"The Bling Ring" is based on an article from Vanity Fair.  Some teenagers from fairly wealthy families decide to start robbing celebrity homes by trolling internet gossip sites.  They learn which celebrities (whose fashion sense they admire) are away from home and burglarize them.  Outside of the actual events (which are chronicled very closely to the truth), Coppola's adaption focuses on young people's obsession with celebrity.  The dialogue is, of course, crafted for a film but Coppola includes a few choice quotes from the actual criminals.  These quotes are the most ridiculous things the characters say.  It's as if Coppola zeroed in on these snippets and crafted a film based on the pathology implied by them.

The camerawork is soft and easy, yet ready to explode into an orgy of avarice.  Jewelry, shoes, blouses, and sunglasses are treated like buried treasure.  Haute couture designer names are cast about like gold coins.  The clean, bland, almost pastel world of these kids' normal lives serves as a marvelous juxtaposition to the crazed, brightly colored, feeding frenzies that erupt when these kids enter their favorite celebrities' homes.

The performances are ok, if a little underplayed.  The line delivery is often flat and monotonous.  But that acting choice permeates so many of the performances for so much of the movie that I wonder if that was an intentional direction given to the actors.  It's as if the characters' apathy is expressed through their line readings.  The two actors who avoid this (and therefore shine) are Emma Watson and Leslie Mann.  Mann plays Watson's mother.  I think that they are allowed to be expressive because those characters are not apathetic.  Mann wants her family to be the best they can be.  And Watson doesn't want to just look like a celebrity, she wants to be a celebrity.

"The Bling Ring" is definitely worth your time.  It's only 90 minutes long and the pacing is incredibly brisk.  I can't wait for the next 3-4 years to pass by.  That's how long Coppola usually takes to put out a new movie.  But until then, it's good to know there's an awesome lady out there making great movies.

7.5 out of 10