Now that I have seen it I can confirm this movie will be a monster hit with women. I don't know how it's tracking so far but by the sheer amount of chicks crying in the theater when I saw it the word of mouth is going to be massive!
And part of that is that Bradley Cooper does everything right here. While the story of course is a tale of clichés it's hard to argue against the scope and ambition that he embraces, effectively making the film bigger than the sum of its parts. Front and center is his own performance, his own personal tour-de-force, where he impresses the most because it doesn't feel like the kind of self-promotion that so many actor-directed star vehicles end up as. The actors he surrounds himself with here say a lot too. Sam Elliott is the only actor who could've played the role he did, and the peculiar randomness of Dave Chappelle's role (paired with an almost cameo appearance by Eddie Griffin) show that Cooper thinks out of the box too. If his vision is as clear as it appears to be here, his actor-director career can soar to great heights.
Of course his true master play is the perfect casting of Lady Gaga. The film generously takes from her real life story to give the clichéd rise from ugly duckling to iconic pop star an irreplaceable authenticity that is only matched by her genuine talent on display.
Again, this film is as clichéd a tale as they come, but Cooper and Gaga put in all the work to make it more than that and I frankly can't draw any other conclusion that they pulled it off.
Country music...
