Jennifer Lopez wants to have her cake and eat it, too.
It has been a largely successful strategy for her. Lopez attained superstar status after launching her music career with 1999’s On The 6, showing that she was not only a charismatic actress but an enjoyable pop act with hits like “If You Had My Love” and “Waiting for Tonight.” She carved out a unique spot in the entertainment landscape with her multi-hyphenate abilities, breaking records and establishing herself as one of the biggest cultural forces of the century so far. Of course, that comes with hangups, especially those that sell tabloid magazines and digital ad space on TMZ.
For as long as Lopez has been a superstar, people have been fascinated by her romantic relationships and their purported ephemerality. Whatever its fairness or accuracy, there is a prevailing narrative about Lopez’s personal life: that she is a serial romantic, a Gen X/millennial-era Elizabeth Taylor. (One knock against said comparison: Taylor had been married six times by age 54, while Lopez is two behind her.) One can certainly understand why, after marrying long-time love Ben Affleck nearly 20 years after their first split (which can’t help looking like a rom-com she would’ve starred in), Lopez would want to share her side of her love story (or stories).
The manifestation is This is Me… Now: A Love Story, the companion cinematic project to her album of the same time, which is a sequel to This is Me… Then, her 2003 album dedicated to Affleck. Co-written by Lopez, Now is a heavily fictionalized retelling of Bennifer 2.0, soundtracked with music from the album and featuring a bevy of fantastical sequences and celebrity cameos from Jane Fonda, Keke Palmer, Post Malone, and more. The hour-long film aims to help audiences understand the emotional and psychological circumstances that facilitated Lopez and Affleck’s reunion, such as her preference for convenience over substantial connection, her steadfast belief in romantic love, and how that belief may have short-changed love for herself. At the same time, Now seeks to poke fun at her public persona with jokes about sex addiction, therapy, and divine intervention, as well as self-referential nods to her music for good measure.
Earnest self-reflection and self-aware parody are not mutually exclusive modes, but they are tricky to pull off. And if anyone could do it well, it is Jennifer Lopez, whose persona often straddles the two. Sadly, Now lacks her flexibility, as it’s deeply strained by its desire to achieve both aims without fully succeeding at either. The primary culprit is the story. It takes a fairly straightforward premise – two soulmates re-discovering each other after two decades – and mythologizes it to confounding proportions. The story is flimsy in the best circumstances, with paper-thin characterizations, off-putting jokes, and narrative beats that lazily anonymize and overcomplicate Lopez’s journey. One of the joys of fictionalization is to stretch the truth to derive creative insight that simple recollection wouldn’t allow. There are few compelling insights into the Lopez mythos, which render the exercise disappointing and even frustrating as director Dave Meyers whips from one CGI set piece to the next. It leaves you feeling more disconnected from the superstar than you might’ve been before.
The story’s lack of care lends credence to the likelihood that Now was initially a visual album in the vein of Beyoncé’s Lemonade that was later expanded into a “cinematic odyssey.” It often feels like the narrative is an afterthought to the film’s musical numbers, haphazardly constructed to connect disparate music videos loosely. Funnily enough, the film is far more successful in that context. While much of the connective tissue is disposable, the musical numbers are very engaging, with creative set pieces, excellent choreography, and some of Lopez’s most potent music in years. “Hearts and Flowers,” which takes place in a cyberpunk-inspired factory that services a literal beating heart, is the film’s best musical sequence, contending to be one of Lopez’s best-ever music videos. “Rebound” is another highlight, using rope choreography to convey toxic relationships.
“Hearts and Flowers” and “Rebound,” among others, are the closest that Now comes to achieving a solid balance of winking self-awareness and open-hearted sincerity. The former has its tongue firmly in cheek, depicting Lopez as a hapless worker to the heart’s literal machinations. On the other hand, the latter number skews more earnest in its use of music and dance to demonstrate her romantic turmoil. The musical sequences work as earnest or parodic statements because they don’t try to shoehorn both modes together. Each number, from “Broken Like Me” to “Midnight Trip to Vegas,” has a clear thematic tone. The script tying them together lacks such tonal clarity, rapidly bouncing between humor and solemnity without substantially pausing to consider how it impacts or undercuts its story.
And so, Jennifer Lopez tries to have her cake and eat it too. Now is meant to be the definitive statement on her love life, capable of fearlessly skewers said life while seeking understanding and compassion for her choices. The film’s narrative undermines that goal and prevents it from falling comfortably into the camp category it seemed destined for. And yet, Now does succeed as a primarily music-driven project that reinforces Lopez’s status as a charismatic, well-rounded talent. One might think that is enough for Lopez, but given the personal investment and ambition (never mind her album’s lead single, “Can’t Get Enough), it will likely read as a disappointment.
This Is Me…Now will be available to stream exclusively on Prime Video on February 16, 2024.
Now does succeed as a primarily music-driven project that reinforces Lopez’s status as a charismatic, well-rounded talent. One might think that is enough for Lopez, but given the personal investment and ambition (never mind her album’s lead single, “Can’t Get Enough), it will likely read as a disappointment.
-
GVN Rating 5
-
User Ratings (0 Votes)
0
A late-stage millennial lover of most things related to pop culture. Becomes irrationally irritated by Oscar predictions that don’t come true.