Starlet

Dir: Sean Baker

2012

****

First and foremost, Sean Baker is a director with a great eye. He makes it look easy, like anyone could just point and shoot. In many respects you can, if you have the talent, because he has also proven that you don’t need a huge budget and everything that comes with a big production, you just need a good idea, a camera and a few great performances. Okay, so you do need more than that, but he has shown that greatness can be achieved from simplicity – and talent. Starlet explores the unlikely friendship between 21-year-old Jane and 85-year-old Sadie, two women whose meet by chance in California's San Fernando Valley. Jane, who also mysteriously introduces herself as Tess, is a young woman who lives in an apartment with her two annoying roommates; Melissa and Melissa's boyfriend Mikey. She also lives with her Chihuahua, Starlet. Jane’s room is small and empty and one morning she asks Melissa if she can paint it but Melissa says the room cannot be changed because Mikey might need it for "shoots". Instead of painting the room, Jane decides to buy new furniture at neighborhood yard sales in order to decorate it. At one such sale she comes across an old woman named Sadie, from whom she buys a thermos. She suggests that it would make a nice vase, which annoys Sadie. Jane is incredibly annoying. She is vacuous, rather stupid and has a care-free attitude that makes me want to break things. She returns home to find Melissa and Mikey arguing, and while cleaning the thermos out for some flowers she’d bough she discovers a stash of money inside. She decides not to announce it to her housemates and hides the money in her room. She spends some of the money on extravagant luxuries for herself, like designer clothes and getting her nails painted ($475 for nails!!!) but then decides to return the rest of the money to Sadie. Sadie, however, dismisses Jane before she can explain. While sitting in her car, not sure what to do next, she sees Sadie take a cab to the grocery store and decides to follow. Jane convinces the waiting cab driver to leave, paying him for his time and telling him that she is a friend who will take Sadie home. Sadie is taken aback by Jane but agrees to a ride home when Jane refuses to back down. Back at Sadie's house, Jane hangs around refusing to leave. My god she’s annoying. In the end she gives her number to a skeptical Sadie and tells her to call her if she needs anything. Jane later surprises Sadie at her local bingo game, having mentioned that she goes every Saturday. Once more paying off Sadie's taxi, she drives her home and asks her about whether she wins at bingo. Sadie responds by spraying Jane with mace, believing that she is trying to con her out of money. The police are called and after speaking to them Jane drives off without any intention of seeing Sadie ever again. Sadie calls Jane the next day to reconcile, much to Jane’s surprise. The pair spend some time together and Jane learns that Sadie, a widow, loves Paris but has never visited the city. She also learns that Sadie is the widow of Frank, a professional gambler, who left her a wealth of money upon his death many years ago. Sadie tells Jane that she doesn’t have any children. The cash in the thermos would have been one of many secret stashes of money Sadie would have been unaware of. Meanwhile, Melissa is fired from her job. It transpires that she and Jane are pornstars who work for the same agency. Jane convinces their boss to suspend Melissa for a month instead of dismissing her, and Jane consequently gets a promotion. While Jane is at work, she leaves Starlet with Sadie, who loses the dog while tending to her garden. Sadie recovers the dog after a desperate and exhausting search. When Jane arrives to retrieve Starlet, Sadie seems troubled and wants to put an end to their friendship, which leaves Jane upset. Melissa finds Jane’s stash of money and tries to manipulate her into spending it on her without letting on that she knows about it. She talks about how friends should care for one another and do nice things for each other. This backfires when Jane decides to buy two first-class tickets to Paris for Sadie and herself. Sadie, however, refuses to go. Jane buys 25 Bingo cards and makes a deal with Sadie that if she wins at bingo, Sadie will go on the trip. Jane loses because Sadie herself wins the game; Sadie ultimately agrees to go on the trip anyway. Back at the apartment, Melissa finds out that Jane has spent all the money on Sadie instead of her. The two engage in a screaming match, and Melissa kicks Jane out and later tells Sadie about the stash of money. Sadie briefly unpacks her suitcase, but then rethinks her action. Later, Jane, ignorant of Sadie's knowledge about the money, picks her up to go to the airport. Sadie asks Jane to stop at the cemetery to leave flowers on the grave of her husband, and Jane notices the nearby grave of Sadie's deceased daughter. She then returns to the car, and they drive away. It’s a touching ending. Dree Hemingway is great as Jane for various different reasons. To come across initially as so incredibly naive and annoying, to then convince the viewer of a moral awakening is rather impressive. She floats about the film quite a lot, switching between concerned friend and flirtatious pornstar quite naturally. Her performance brings nothing but believability to the film, which is what makes it work so well. Besedka Johnson is also wonderful as Sadie. Johnson had wanted to be an actress her whole life and she died just after the film’s completion, her first and last performance. She was clearly a natural. Stella Maeve’s Melissa was great too, and I’d argue that performing that level of annoying is a higher degree of acting. Realism, good story and a visual flare aren’t easy, Sean Baker has talent. That said, he also knows that sex sells and most of his films now feature women in tight underpants/shorts and sexy times. Jane and Melissa really didn’t need to be porn actors but even if they were, the film really didn’t need an actual sex scene to prove it. A porn actress doubled for Dree Hemingway, something that casual viewers might not know, and they really go for it. I’m not sure who this is for, other than the twelve-year old boys who might come across the film on TV late at night who kept watching for all the legs on display. Lucky them I guess but I’d argue that it does nothing for the story or character, other than to provide titillation. It didn’t ruin it for me but it is a little bit of a cheap trick and I’m glad he has since toned down such scenes in his subsequent films. I’ve never enjoyed a film with two such annoying women and an annoying dog so much.