“Natalie Portman tips Vox Lux off balance. The simple act of drinking through a straw is turned into an embarrassing megaslurp. Other actors get shouted down. Maybe, however, that’s the point — not that poor Celeste was shoved into the spotlight by a traumatic event but that popular renown, in a saturated age, is itself a prolonged form of trauma, warping the body’s motions and wrecking any chance of equanimity. Lady Gaga, in A Star Is Born, is far more stirring than Portman but also, strangely, more innocent, alive to the prospect of happiness. Brady Corbet’s film rejects that hope, suggesting that no sooner are you born, as a star, than something within you begins to die.” — from Anthony Lane‘s “Vox Lux Bends to the Temper of the Times,” from the 12.10 New Yorker issue.
