Hauntingly beautiful

Rating: 9/10 (20 October 2018)

An absolute masterpiece by Bradley Cooper, who shines as both the lead and the director. Everything, from the cinematography to the soundtrack, was absolutely perfect to make one of the more darker and realistic musical films of the decade.
Cooper nails it as a successful artist struggling with both a hearing issue and alcohol and drug addiction, successfully brought to the screen in some eerily beautiful scenes. Gaga steals the show however, with both her acting and singing talent brought to the front. She ditches her larger-than-life real-life persona and becomes someone vulnerable who is still amazingly talented. Another actor to surely be put in the spotlight is Sam Elliott, who plays Cooper's older brother. Seriously, who better than Elliott can be the voice of reason and give some heart warming speeches when everything seems lost.
The soundtrack is pure gold. The concert scenes are perfect and intense and if Shallows does not at least get nominated for best original song, the academy will have some explaining to do.
The story unfolds gorgeously as we follow these two people with very different lives come together to form a beautiful romance. The moment Gaga first joined Cooper on stage to perform Shallows is the definition of goosebumps. Their story then unravels, with Cooper descending into a gritty world of drugs and alcohol and Gaga getting sucked up by a slight exaggaration of today's oversaturated pop world. We as an audience can't help but grimace when she changes her beautifully ordinary look with disgusting orange hair, multiple layers of make-up and some gruesome outfits which are not to different from what current pop princesses tend to wear. We feel for both these characters as Cooper watches Gaga's manager develop her 'image', when all Cooper has done the entire film is try to convince her she doesn't need to change anything to be amazing. Every hope for a happy ending we have when Cooper successfully beats his addiction is squashed in the end with his tragic suicide, after which Gaga once again manages to blow everyone away with I Will Never Love Again, truely amazing.