The Bling Ring is a film directed by Sofia Coppola and stars Katie Chang as Rebecca,Israel Broussard as Marc, Emma Watson as Nicki, Claire Julien as Chloe and Taissa Farmiga as Sam. The movie follows a group of teenagers as they rob and steel from celebrities homes as part of their obsession with the rich and famous, along with the brands the rich and famous wear and use. It’s a movie that provides a commentary on society and its obsession with the life of the rich and and famous who have the most expensive and luxurious items that so many in the world seem to just want to have in their lives.
The plot is very simple in this movie and there aren’t any surprises in there. In fact it’s actually based loosely off real life events from a group known as “The Bling Ring”, that actually did a lot of the things seen in this movie. Although the names of the people from the actual Bling Ring are changed in the film. A lot of the films plot actually comes from a Vanity fair article that you can read here, entitled “The Suspects Wore Louboutins”. After watching the movie I did read the article and a lot of the articles quotes can even be heard in the movie when you watch it. So the article was clearly used heavily as a source for creating the film.
The Bling Ring isn’t really a movie that will keep every person entertained, in fact for some it might be a bit too slow or uninteresting and I could understand that. But The Bling Ring is an interesting movie though and tries to make a lot of points about American culture and the obsession people have with celebrities. The characters in The Bling Ring are so obsessed with the celebrities they follow they not only read and watch them, but they went and stole their clothes so they could wear them and be like them. There are also a lot of mentions of expensive fashion brands like Prada, Louboutins, Rolex watches, jewelry and diamonds and expensive cars like BMW and Porsche. These two together mixed and became part of the obsession for these teenagers who just wanted everything that celebrities they idolized like Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan or Rachel Bilson had.
The actors in this movie do okay performances in their roles but I thought that when looking at the films advertising, a lot of it makes it seem like Emma Watson is the main character, which she isn’t. Actually Marc (Israel Broussard) and Rebecca (Katie Chang) are the main characters and I thought Katie Chang did the better performance in this movie but seemed to disappear towards the end. The Bling Ring is only 90 minutes long and while it does make a lot of interesting points throughout about society, it maybe needed a few extra minutes to make a stronger impact on the audience.
The movie has some good visual imagery and it does have great songs added in that add a lot to the movies look and experience when watching. It’s not badly directed or made, in fact its quite good. Its just it didn’t have that thing that makes its great to watch.
It’s one of those films that when after you watch it and observe the behaviour of the characters it gives you a lot to think about. It has interesting points and the characters seem real, at least in the films context, and you get a good glimpse of what the world is like for a certain group of people.
Overall The Bling Ring is an interesting movie to watch and will leave you with some interesting points to think about. If you are a person who is just simply obsessed with the celebrity and the life of the rich and famous, then this movie will definitely be something that makes you think about it. The movie is okay, but it’s possible not everybody will be entertained and it does have some slow parts. But at 90 minutes long, it could be worth watching especially if the topics the movie is attempting to discuss fall into your line of interest.
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