A Star Is Born (1954)
Directed by George Cukor
A movie star helps a young singer-actress find fame, even as age and alcoholism send his own career into a downward spiral.
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What critics compared A Star Is Born to
In Bradley Cooper’s strong feature directorial debut A Star Is Born – a remake of the three namesake films that came before, touchstones of their generations as much as this one will be – Lady Gaga makes her indelible mark as a true blue movie star of the highest calibre, a designation earned only by her undertaking considerable risk that has paid off against odds more stacked than one might readily admit.
Cooper isn't the first one to go down the film's familiar road: This is the fourth “A Star Is Born,” which tosses in references and story points from earlier iterations – notably, the 1954 film with Judy Garland and James Mason, as well as the 1976 version starring Kris Kristofferson and Barbra Streisand.
Telling the downfall story requires more finesse than A Star Is Born is able to manage — the Garland version does this very well and it’s inevitable that this version will always be compared to the ones before it.
As their fortunes start to seesaw, the film acquires some of the stormy turbulence of “A Star Is Born,” as well as glimmers of the doubt and disconnection of “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.”
Does it reinvent or improve upon “Singin’ in the Rain”, “A Star is Born”, “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” and the legions of classic films and musicals it references, borrows from?
And throughout “La La Land,“ there are references to many musicals, from the faux Paris dance finale of “An American in Paris” and the career trajectory melodrama of the 1954 version of “A Star is Born,” as well as the dream ballet from “Oklahoma” and the jazz club scenes from “Funny Face.”
That’s what Chazelle has done with musicals like The Umbrellas of Cherbourg and A Star Is Born and Singin’ in the Rain.
The story, a star-crossed romance between a down-and-out actress (Emma Stone) and a brooding jazzbo (Ryan Gosling), may echo Martin Scorsese's New York, New York (1977) and, earlier still, George Cukor's A Star Is Born (1954).
The plot—her artistic career competes with his artistic career—is an old one, A Star Is Born for the iTunes generation.
There are points where Whitney feels a little bit like George Cukor's 1950s version of A Star Is Born, a film whose domestic conversations and confrontations have a bracing chill because the camera keeps its distance and the moments aren't excessively hyped with background music.
There’s also a touch of shorthand in the depiction of Brown, what with the story’s “A Star Is Born”-like aspects as her career soars while his operates on a more mortal plane.
DaCosta and other cast members, including Arlen Escarpeta as Brown and Mark Rolston as music mogul Clive Davis , almost manage to overcome a cliche-ridden script by Shem Bitterman that proves, if nothing else, that he’s seen either George Cukor ’s “What Price Hollywood” or various versions of its spawn, “A Star Is Born.”
In one scene, a twister rips apart a drive-in playing The Shining, and Helen Hunt's aunt watches Judy Garland in A Star Is Born on TV.
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Fredric March and James Mason have fallen victim to the magpie memories of La La Land in twin incarnations of A Star Is Born.
Carney handles the ambiguous dynamic with care and creativity, avoiding “A Star Is Born” cliches while indulging in all the pleasures the familiar plot has to offer.
That brings us back to the club when Dan first hears Greta's music and things falls into a more linear "A Star is Born" type story with Dan wanting to produce a record and sign Greta onto his label so that he can get back into the good graces of his former partner Saul.
Think "A Star Is Born" meets "All About Eve" and "The Valley of the Dolls" – except in this case, all the girls want to be models, not actresses.
Wild and woolly, the movie is a breathtaking head trip that hails from a long tradition of backstage melodramas: 42nd Street, A Star Is Born, All About Eve, and, yes, that kitschy '90s relic, Showgirls.
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And it is definitely not a rap version of A Star is Born.
It would be nice to report that Original Sin, starring Antonio Banderas and Angelina Jolie as a man and a woman who luuuv only because they hate only because they luuuv, is a timeless and succulent howler in the dirty-damage tradition of ''Indecent Proposal'' and the 1976 ''A Star Is Born.''