The cinema hasn’t always been kind to pop stars. Madonna has some big screen hits, but she also has Shanghai Surprise, Body of Evidence, and the remake of Swept Away. Mariah Carey would probably prefer people forget Glitter, while not even Oscar-winning thespian Cher could save Christina Aguilera’s Burlesque. Luckily Jennifer Lopez was a big time movie star before she sold hit records. What’s more, music movies, like The Eras Tour, are once again popular. In short, the time is right for JLo’s movie version of This is Me…Now.
On Wednesday, the full-length trailer for the film, which accompanies her forthcoming ninth album, went live, and it’s not a concert movie, nor is it a “visual album” like Beyoncé’s acclaimed Lemonade film. It’s…a semi-normal movie? About a thinly veiled version of her? In which her friends accuse her of being a sex addict? And it features narration from Neil deGrasse Tyson?
All that is true, and it’s possible this Amazon Prime film — which the trailer boasts is from the “heart, soul, and dreams” of its star — could be hubris unbound. It could also reveal some genuinely surprising aspects of Lopez’s life and personality.
For one thing, the film’s Lopez is shown shuffling through multiple husbands, as she has in real life. (Though four honestly isn’t too many.) That’s not very surprising. But what is is a scene where her own friends hold what looks like an intervention, accusing her not of marrying too often, but of being a straight-up sex addict. Later in the trailer we see her in what appears to be a Sex Addicts Anonymous Meeting.
“This is her own story in her own words,” the trailer boasts. Prime Video, meanwhile, refers to it as a “narrative-driven cinematic odyssey, steeped in mythological storytelling and personal healing.” There are lots of fantastical, expensive-looking musical numbers that appear to delve into aspects of her life.
And there’s also the world’s most famous astrophysicist and movie ruiner Neil deGrasse Tyson, heard musing about the cosmos on the film’s narration track. May he not try to poke logic/science holes in a film featuring his voice.
Also billed in the Mad Libs cast are Fat Joe, Trevor Noah, Post Malone, Keke Palmer, Sofia Vergara, Derek Hough, and her current husband, Ben Affleck.
Will this be another Lemonade, winding up on snooty film critics’ lists and taught at the academic level? Or will it be a Crossroads? The world will find out on Feb. 16, when the This is Me…Now film drops, two days ahead of the album itself. You can watch the trailer in the video above.
(Via Entertainment Weekly)
