JLo’s life spun into musical film
OK, so maybe we’re not tracking her jet travel online like amateur spies.
But Taylor Swift-mania aside, let’s not forget that another force of nature, J.Lo, has been the ultimate celebrity for decades. Singer. Dancer. Rom-com actor, charismatic and charming. Social media queen and tabloid magnet. Jennifer Lopez, 54, has been doing this pop goddess thing for a very long time and very well.
All of which is to say that when she sings now that she and husband Ben Affleck don’t need to give a $%& about how others feel, who are we to argue? Who are we to argue with J.Lo about anything?
That’s the perfect vantage point from which to assess the curious creation that is “This is Me… Now: A Love Story,” the movie accompanying her recently released album. Some will call it a mere music video — it’s directed by Dave Meyers, who has done hundreds — but it’s heftier than that. If the plot feels truly chaotic, blending mythology, astrology, autobiography, confessional, modern rom-com and Old Hollywood glamour, it is so J.Lo that it feels logical, too.
Whether that means the film is good is a matter of how you feel about Lopez. She has brought everything to the table here: her talents, her fertile imagination and her wallet, too, self-financing when money for the film fell through, to the tune of a reported $20 million. Talk about selfbelief, which is the moral of the film, if expressed too conveniently. If you can’t love yourself, Lopez and co-writer Mark Walton tell us, you can’t love anyone else.
Though channeling her own life, Lopez doesn’t have a name in the film — she’s billed as Artist. Before we meet her, we begin with Puerto Rican mythology: the story of Alida and Taroo, starcrossed lovers from enemy tribes. They can’t be together, so the gods turn her into a flower (Lopez appears in the animation as Alida) and Taroo into a hummingbird, destined to forever seek her. The Artist heard the tale as a child and decided what she wanted to be when she grew up: “in love.”
Artist’s love adventure takes us to a “Metropolis”like sequence in a dystopian-looking factory, its purpose not clear but in any case a great setting for one of many dance numbers. Turns out, though, the depleting oxygen and dancers in hazmat suits are all part of a dream. We learn this in the Artist’s appointment the next day with her therapist (rapper Fat Joe).
He asks how it’s going with the new guy. Not so well — the guy’s a Libra and, more to the point, violent, as we learn in the song “Rebound,” about a toxic relationship, with a powerful dance sequence that has her pulled back into an abuser’s clutches.
Time for the Zodiac Council to weigh in, up in the stars, led by Jane Fonda as Sagittarius, who peers down at our girl and says: “I don’t get it!” Yup, agrees Libra (Trevor Noah) — Libras and Leos are supposed to go well together.
It won’t shock you that the Artist ultimately learns to love herself. If she didn’t, we wouldn’t have a fun re-creation of Gene Kelly in “Singin’ in the Rain.” We also wouldn’t have reason to hear the songs comprising the new album, coming more than 20 years after “This Is Me… Then,” written during her first go-round with Affleck.
Famously, they broke up. Famously, they reunited. (Affleck appears here in a sly cameo.) We watched it all. And we’ll keep watching this most durable of superstars.
No MPA rating
Running time: 1:05 How to watch: Amazon Prime Video