Shia LaBeouf has been nursing this braided extension of his personality for a few months now, but it has finally arrived on the scene via the Tribeca Film Festival. The Daily Mail has hounded it for a while and wants to call it a rattail, Vanity Fair has come out to defend it, but as Cynthia Greenburg from Deadline says, “all that matters is the hair.”
https://twitter.com/greenbuggin/status/589133143027752960
And that’s the truth at this point. LaBeouf has been on a “creative” odyssey that has taken him from taunting Daniel Clowes with sky writing, borrowing performance art ideas from Marina Abramović, Killing Nazis in Fury, and now creating videos for Sia while unleashing his God whip off the side of his head. There was probably some other movies in there with some bag head action, but it’s all pretty exhausting.
The ‘tail on the other hand is not exhausting. It is braided like LaBeouf’s story, a record of time in an organic state. That or he’s just really, really excited for the new Star Wars movies. I say that for the obvious reasons:
They even have the blue band at the end to really send the reference home. In fact, the entire track of LaBeouf’s career could be aligned with the prequel films, adding a little depth to this hair thing. He started as a boy, much like Jake Lloyd’s Anakin, living in servitude to Disney until he earned his freedom and left for the greater galaxy of Hollywood. Then he fell in love with a lovely maiden known as Michael Bay, a romance that shot him straight to the Moon for three Transformers films, but eventually poisoned his existence with the dark side of life. Sound like somebody you know? Nic Cage and Anakin Skywalker if you’re wondering.
And now we’re still locked in that zone, waiting for LaBeouf to cut off his hand and possibly grow into the most popular actor of all time (or at least give life to an actor that can take that spot).
What I’m trying to say is that I like the braided rattail. It’s a good look. Throw it on the back of a motorcycle, resting on the shoulder of a sweet denim vest, and let the wind do its worst. Cast him in a movie about historically inaccurate Scottish warriors and let him write poetry about the Loch Ness Monster. Do something with this.
(Via Vanity Fair)
