Her Smell

Much like it's titular character, this movie is often a big mess with glimmers of promise poking through the cracks. It aims to embody the archetype of the rock 'n roll downward spiral, but really just comes off like Courtney Love cosplay. Elizabeth Moss is an immensely talented actress, but she may be playing this character a little over the top. They beat the point into the ground that she messes up everything she touches, but before long she becomes insufferable to watch and impossible to root for. Of course this is the intent on some level, so in a way, it does succeed. It has success elsewhere with the camera work and almost Birdman-esque way they stitched together some near one take scenes that nicely capture the frantic backstage energy. Some scenes do drag a bit though and the film struggles to justify it's 2+ hr run-time.

Becky Something (Elisabeth Moss) is the lead singer of an once successful punk rock group. She struggles with drugs, drunkenness, instability, personal drama, and professional chaos. She's fighting with ex-husband Danny (Dan Stevens). Her mother Ania (Virginia Madsen) supports her through thick and thin. Ali van der Wolff (Gayle Rankin) and Marielle Hell (Agyness Deyn) are her long suffering bandmates. Their manager Howard Goodman (Eric Stoltz) is desperate to get her to finish her next album and recruits a new band called Akergirls. Its three members are Crassie Cassie (Cara Delevingne), Roxie Rotten (Ashley Benson), and Dottie O.Z. (Dylan Gelula).

It's an applaudable performance from Moss but the problem is that it gets rather monotonous. The constant chaos becomes the same thing over and over again until it stops being interesting. The shaman threatens to push it over into silliness. Like the band, she needs a bigger second to bounce off with narratively. Agyness Deyn is given a section which helps a lot but she may be better as the straight man lead. At one point, I assume that the movie is setting up Cara Delevingne as the second character but then she fades into the background. It's over two hours and much of it has Becky's chaos. It needs a second character to provide stable story telling.

A psychedelic description of a decadent female punk singer. Alcohol, drugs, oversized egos, squabbles as childish as insignificant ... and tutti quanti! Talent? We are still looking for it. With an omnipresent and disturbing music, the atmosphere is excessively dark, punk and degenerate. An absolute nightmare!

Small confidence: I preferred leaving the air-conditioned movie theater and joining the suffocating heat wave rather than endure this irritating film, even if Elisabeth Moss is absolutley astonishing. If I like to listen to this or that album, the more-or-less-private life of the artists disinterest me to the highest point. Therefore, in my humble opinion, this movie is a complete nuisance and almost pointless.

This movie could be compelling if you could hear the dialogue. Not sure why the background sound is louder than the dialog, but it essentially makes it hard to follow. In one scene you hear the leaking water more than anything else. I wanted to like this movie more.

I kind of liked this movie. The realistic footage and acting were compelling. But ultimately there is just not enough interesting material to sustain such a long movie. What was the director/producer thinking? The same story, the same vibe, the same message, etc. could have easily been told as a 1:30 or 1:40 moved -- a good 40 minuted of filler less. At some point I just got bored, which is a shame as there was a good movie (still nothing amazing, but a 6.5 I want to say) in here somewhere. In the end it rates as just average.