You don’t need to know who Charli XCX is in order to understand The Moment. While there are undoubtedly Easter Eggs hidden in the film for devoted fans of the singer’s work, the genre mash-up still works reasonably well as a standalone text.
On the surface, Aidan Zamiri‘s film (he directs and co-writes, along with Bertie Brandes) presents itself as a pseudo-documentary, following the singer for a few weeks as the record label desperately tries to extend Charli’s stunningly successful “Brat summer.” This, of course, maps onto real world events, including (possibly real?) TV interviews with Stephen Colbert and news footage/stories about the singer’s popularity, including how the colour/name was adopted by US presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
First on the agenda: a concert film paid for by Amazon in advance of Charli’s tour, which kicks off in two weeks with a sold-out stadium show. That’s the timeline of the film, which is shot in grainy cinema vérité-style as Charli takes meetings and rehearses, with occasional breaks to party with her entourage or, in a moment of panic, take an ill-advised vacation to Ibiza.
Complicating matters is the label’s mandated director, Johannes Godwin (Alexander Skarsgård). Although Charli and her friend/collaborator Celeste (Hailey Benton Gates) plan to stick to the mature themes of the material (with the eventual goal to kill Brat so that Charli can move on), the label, lead by Rosanna Arquette‘s Tammy Pitman, insists on Godwin, an incredibly popular concert director with no artistic vision. He plans to sand off all of the show’s edges (the sex; the cocaine, etc) in order to sell a “story” that appeals to a family friendly market (think: glow in the dark, Coldplay concert wristbands).
Charli, playing a fictionalized version of herself (along with many other celebrities who cameo, such as Rachel Sennott and Kylie Jenner), is caught in the centre of the battle of wills. As she struggles under the weight of demands and expectations from everyone in her life, the singer/songwriter becomes increasingly frazzled, frustrated, and unmoored, plunging The Moment into something akin to a psychological thriller around the mid-way point of the film.
It’s not quite Black Swan-levels of hallucinatory nightmare, but Zamiri and Brandes’ script, as well as the woman at its center, aren’t afraid to take the film into some deeply uncomfortable territory. Take, for example, the whole Ibiza trip, which winds up feeling like a fever dream merged with a body horror text.
Anchoring the production is Charli XCX, whose “character” comes across alternatively as a super savvy artist; an icon to her rabid (predominantly girls and gays) fans; and a young woman being pulled in a million different directions by a team and an industry who don’t entirely understand her (or her appeal).
There are so many moments of awkward cringe comedy as Charli is confronted with drivers who don’t recognize her; staffers like her agent Tim (Jamie Demetriou) who parrot back nonsense in an effort to tell Charli what he thinks she wants to hear; and, in the case of an extremely opinionated facial aesthetician, belligerent rants about her energy.
The film is often extremely funny and the satire of the (music) industry can be quite biting. Arguably one of the sharpest recurring bits involves a Brat credit card in the same signature lime green as the album and marketed primarily to Charli’s young queer audience (“How will they prove they’re gay?” Charli asks incredulously, immediately deducing that the campaign is utterly ridiculous).
Alas, there is a saggy bit in the transition between the second and third act. It’s evident that the film is barreling towards a climax at the stadium show, which remains a source of contention as Johannes and Celeste butt heads over the creative vision.
And then there’s a confusing revelation regarding the visual style of the film. The grainy look is conducive with a warts-at-all documentary approach, though the camera’s presence is never remarked upon…at least until Charli breaks the fourth wall during a particularly challenging moment in Ibiza.
It would have been better to remove this beat because it doesn’t make sense (who is operating the camera?) It also runs counter to the narrative (Johannes exists to document the show, but there’s never any mention that he’s shooting B-roll). It simply doesn’t work and undermines the entire stylistic approach of the film, which is unfortunate because it could have been easily excised without losing anything.
As it is, the bizarre, genre-blending hybridity of the film is easily its best feature. The Moment has something to offer a broad range of audiences, regardless of whether you celebrated Brat summer or you can’t tell Charli from Sabrina Carpenter or Olivia Rodrigo. It’s a surprisingly clever, occasionally confronting, unusual slice of media satire; for that reason, it merits a look. 4/5
The Moment is out in theaters Feb 6
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