Maps to the Stars

2014
Director: David Cronenberg
Writer: Bruce Wagner

My knowledge of David Cronenberg isn’t hugely extensive, although I know he’s famed for his body horror films, those that take a cold and clinical look at the faults and failures of characters’ bodies as a study of their damaged psyches, and how the dangerous flaws of the societies they live in drive their minds and bodies to destruction. Well at least that’s what I’ve read from the few films of his I’ve seen, from Videodrome as James Woods grows a brain tumour after watching a malevolent TV broadcast designed to purge world populations, to Dead Ringers where Jeremy Irons’ twin gynecologists suffer depression and addiction coupled to the screwed-up relationships they have with their female patients. These all come across as extremely complex themes and narratives when thinking back to them, and Maps to the Stars proves itself to be just as layered and difficult to read.

The film is part of this newer phase in Cronenberg’s later career, with a focus less on the bodies of his protagonists and more on the damaged psychologies and violent conditions in which they live. Beginning perhaps with A History of Violence with Viggo Mortensen’s internal struggle over his potentially violent past, to Eastern Promises and its tales of family drama in the brutal world of the Russian mafia in London, and finally to a study of psychology itself with A Dangerous Method, about the working relations of Freud and Jung. Based on appearances, Maps to the Starts seems to share the closest relationship with Cosmopolis in terms of content and visual style, although I haven’t seen that film so can’t comment.

Beginning with a shot of a disheveled Agatha (Mia Wasikowska), complete with grey cheap clothes, elbow-length gloves, trimmed bob-haircut and disfiguring burn scars, hunched asleep on a bus to Los Angeles, Maps to the Stars is a study of the damaged souls who live and work in Hollywood. Immediately after getting off the bus, blinking in the California sunlight, Agatha hires Jerome (Robert Pattinson) and his limo, happily paying $200 and showing from the start that nothing is at it seems. We are introduced to the Weiss family: dad Stafford (John Cusack), a money-driven TV psychologist who uses dubious methods on his numerous high profile clients; stressed wife Cristina (Olivia Williams), the ambitious manager to their son Benjie (Evan Bird), a 13 year old child star who’s just finished a stint in rehab.

The star at the heart of this constellation is Havana Segrand, (Julianne Moore), the unhinged minor star looking for her next big break by playing the role famously played by her mother in a remake of her most famous film. Unfortunately for Havana, she is better known for being physically and sexually abused by her mother, who died in a fire, than for her own acting abilities.

Hardly anything about this film is subtle; it’s a scathing and vitriolic satire on Hollywood politics. It carries on the tradition of previous insights on the fucked-up underbelly of showbusiness, from Sunset Boulevard to The Player and even Mommie Dearest. Maps takes things even further, creating an insidious hyper-reality which argues that the extent of Hollywood’s extreme self-love and narcissism results in incest of all kinds. All are left slightly deranged – many are subject to mysterious visions and hauntings which vividly and violently expose characters’ biggest flaws to themselves. Even the most outwardly sane character Jerome the driver finds himself unable to form relationships with others without viewing it as ultimately a form of research on which he can learn and propel himself to stardom.

It’s here that Maps proves itself to be more Cronenberg-ian than first appeared. It seemed he might have been going slightly off-topic, choosing to make a Hollywood satire, which seems like too easy a target for the director. But Maps ultimately turns into a truly dark and often unpleasant study of skewed minds. I’m not going to pretend to fully understand this film; the Freudian nightmare of why Havana is so desperate to play the abusive mother, as if trying to exorcise the internal demons. Or Agatha’s mysterious motivations for coming to LA, and getting a job as Havana’s assistant. Plenty of questions are left unanswered, and the twisting layers and no-holds-barred content turn this into a living nightmare.

The performances are uniformally excellent, from the more understated turns by Pattinson and Wasikowska, to a shocking performance by the young Evan Bird who makes the young and cruelly spoilt Benjie believable, even at his most heinous. This is Julianne Moore’s show though – going for childish brat to driven power-fiend within single scenes, and showing emotional breakdowns with such fearlessness as to make them both genuinely heart-wrenching and voyeurisitcally fascinating. She’s able to give Havana a tortured soul beneath the histrionics.

Sometimes the blends of tone can come across as a jumble, switching from almost slapstick-like comedy (Havana giving Agatha sex advise while sitting on the toilet), to gossipy expose (the Weiss family stories), to warped horrorish drama (the ghostly apparitions). The satire, despite being repeatedly purported as being based in reality, sometimes comes across as heavy-handed in attempts to be funny, such as the teen girl stars declaring another actress in her 20s is menopausal (although thinking about it, maybe I shouldn’t be so optimistic as to believe such people can’t exist). And the narrative is overburdened, trying to cram too much in for too many characters that sometimes some plotlines are left hanging or underdeveloped. Sometimes the attempts to combine satire with ghost story and shocking expose don’t always gel.

But in the end, I’m very glad I watched Maps to the Stars. I’d say I enjoyed it in a perverse sort of way; it’s far more devilishly entertaining than I was expecting and at times laugh out loud funny. Saying that, there are moments that are genuinely surreal and horrible, making this a strange watch. When the credits rolled, I found myself sitting speechless for a good while, unable to articulate what I’d just seen. It should be commended when a film does have that effect on you, although it’s unnerving to be unable to understand why.