Dir. Chris Atkins, UK, 2009, 103mins
Cast: Max Clifford, Chris Atkins
Review by Christopher Upton
The news media has a fairly big stake in what happens in a lot of people's lives. Its influence can be seen in posters, magazines, and books and now, slightly ironically, in a film telling you how the medium has influenced your thinking. This central contradiction isn't the main fault with Starsuckers though, the main problem here is that the facts are so widely known and experienced everyday that finding a new angle to approach celebrity from is virtually impossible.
Set out like a magic show, Starsuckers takes viewers on a trip from the Fifties to the present day, explaining how the entertainment industry aims to shape and control us as consumers throughout our lives. It is also interspersed with some investigative journalism as the filmmakers set up various media pundits with phoney stories to test the honesty of the newspaper industry.
There is no doubt that this documentaries heart is in the right place. Exposing exactly how we're controlled from birth is an important thing to do, and if it could shock people out of stupor it would be a worthwhile exercise. However, everyone already has at least a vague idea what goes on behind the scenes. It is ingrained so deeply in our culture that we simply accept manipulation, and how despicable that statement is, is infinitely debatable. Basing a documentary on the uncovering of such a vast story seems like overreaching before it even started.
The documentary benefits most from its scenes of near unbelievable exposing of journalists lack of morality in order to produce celebrity gossip. Getting Max Clifford to divulge the extent to which he will go to protect the publicity of his charges is simultaneously sickening and infuriating, because of the money changing hands and the ease with which it's be carried out.
Had the documentary chosen just to expose the easy corruptibility of the news media when it comes to celebrities, and how far they're willing to go to destroy people's lives based on the ‘celebrity status', then this documentary would have succeeded with ease. There is more than enough present in Starsuckers to indicate this, however they took on a topic far too big for them to corral.
Chris Atkins has obvious passion in exposing what he sees as wrong and the documentary is certainly earnest, it just has too much on its mind. By limiting the focus this would have had a more impressive and powerful impact, unfortunately this will be one piece of media which will fail to have mass effect.
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