SparkNotes Version
The Deep Dive (Spoiler Alert!)
Gathering my empty popcorn bin and heading out of my local AMC (with AMC Stubs, duh!), I was rendered speechless in verbalizing the beautiful discomfort I was experiencing after screening Priscilla, which stars Cailee Spaney (notable for her 2018 roles in the Pacific Rim Uprising and neo-noir thriller Bad Times at the El Royale) and Euphoria’s beloved asswipe Jacob Elordi as the legendary rock couple.
Adapted from Priscilla Presley’s 1985 memoir Elvis and Me, Priscilla is simply not some straightforward biopic like Baz Luhrmann’s 2022 Elvis. We don’t rock in our seats to “Heartbreak Hotel” (thanks to the Presley estate turning down any involvement in the film), the King of Rock’s glitz-and-glam lifestyle is less centerfold, and I highly doubt Elordi’s Elvis accent will be lingering for months on end… unlike his Elvis-playing predecessor, Austin Butler. Despite some philistines deeming this film as boring/dull while critiquing its lack of dialogue, these naysayers fail to grasp the cinematographic prowess of Sophia Coppola’s unparalleled techniques in capturing the essence of human connection through spaces and silences.
With her extensive directorial library of mood films, Priscilla shines as yet another atmospheric example of Coppola’s ability to force her viewers to feel rather than passively watch her work. Let’s take Lost in Translation, Coppola’s acclaimed 2003 classic with a budget of a mere $4 million starring Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson. Alone in the isolating landscape of Tokyo, Murray and Johansson’s performances showcase the poignant beauty of fleeting connections as they wield the power of silence, allowing the unexpressed to resonate more profoundly than words ever could. The same tactic is used in Coppola’s 2010 masterpiece Somewhere, in which a jaded Hollywood actor (Stephen Dorff) reexamines his life of excess and pointlessness following a surprise visit from his young daughter (a baby Elle Fanning) during an extended stay at the Chateau Marmont. Somewhere’s leisurely pace and moments of stillness contribute to the overall quietude, inviting viewers to immerse themselves in Dorff’s character's contemplative journey as he grapples with his celebrity isolation and fatherhood responsibilities.
See, I initially felt disappointed as I didn’t get to witness the adrenaline-rush of Elvis’s debauchery, whether that be his notorious drug-scapades or sex-capades, but taking a second beat, that was indeed the intention: experiencing Priscilla’s isolationism from her point of view. While in Elvis, we witness a revolving door of women entering his bedroom, the extent of Priscilla’s knowledge was predominantly through tabloids and conjecture. In Elvis, the King is shot pill-popping every other scene, but maybe Priscilla’s extent of witnessing his infamous drug addiction rests mainly in his sleeping pill habits resulting from his fear of going to sleep. Point being, while the audience may not have experienced the action-packed scenes of degeneracy, we received something more unique: we were in the room with Priscilla Presley.
Prepare yourself for one-hour and fifty-minutes of mood swings. For the first half, you’ll simply be uncomfortably shuffling in your seat as the 24-year-old Elvis’s unsubtle grooming of the 14-year-old Priscilla begins in West Germany in 1959. No wonder Lisa Marie Presley attempted to cockblock the film coming to market, expressing to Coppola her concern over her father’s portrayal as a “predator.” While Coppola may have attempted to mitigate Lisa Marie’s concerns with the promise of a nuanced representation for both her parents, I refuse to be the one to fall into the trap of downplaying Priscilla and Elvis’s inappropriate age gap nor romanticizing the confines of patriarchal domesticity.
By Coppola’s design, Priscilla’s earlier personality feels oddly muted, engulfed by Elvis’s rich, overwhelming presence. Beyond her beauty and innocent charm, I struggled understanding much that allured Elvis to Priscilla in their clandestine conversations. While they seemingly bond over their loneliness in a foreign country, Priscilla doesn’t seem to open her mouth much beyond some empty platitudes and reassuring one-liners. As Elvis confides in the teenage girl over his grief from his mother’s recent death and his fears of irrelevance, he’s seemingly just talking AT her. To count on my hands the number of times a man has trauma dumped his life’s innards on me under the pretext of having established a deep connection, despite myself not getting two words in edgewise. Once Elvis returns to the states, we find the puppy-eyed teenager doodling his name in her notebooks while impatiently waiting for his call for months. In my book, the guy is gone if he doesn’t text me within a week.
Your attention will indubitably begin to wane as the high school senior Priscilla leaves her parents and Germany behind when moving into Graceland, where isolation is practically personified as a character of its own. Similar to Coppola’s Marie Antoinette, a young girl is thrown into a circumstance outside of her control while depicting the inherent boredom that comes with a life of luxury. With his delicate little bird trapped in his gilded cage, Elvis’s grooming takes full throttle as the sole decision-maker over Priscilla, preventing her from working in a nearby boutique to earn her own livelihood, joining him while on tour in LA, and even dictating her appearance (and I indeed preferred that brown gown). Yet the aspect most difficult to reconcile in one’s head are those moments of genuine, tangible connection between Priscilla and Elvis as they hibernate in Elvis's room indulging breakfast in bed or sharing the intensity of a cerebral acid trip. Like I said, not excusing Elvis’s abuse of power, but in the dullness of Graceland, we see why those few moments of pure ecstasy (no pun intended) with Elvis stand as Priscilla’s saving grace as she grapples with her total loss of autonomy.
Throughout the film, Elvis withstands from having sex with Priscilla, proclaiming that “they have to control our desires, or our desires will control us.” Elvis’s predatory relationship with Priscilla seemingly remained in the gray zone of the audience’s conscience, as sexual intimacy hadn’t entered the equation, yet when Elvis declares “we’re getting married” (emphasis on the fact it wasn’t a proposal but rather a statement) and Elvis and Priscilla begin having S – E – X, Priscilla’s circumstances go from bad to worse.
It’s evident that Elvis wasn’t waiting for his child-bride to become of age; rather, he clearly suffers from Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic concept of the Madonna/Whore Complex, in which individuals compartmentalize women as either virtuous, nurturing figures (Madonnas) or sexually alluring, seductive beings (Whores) – often hindering their ability to form healthy, integrated relationships with women. Priscilla is a princess waiting to be ravished, and once she’s ravished, the Madonna-Whore Complex takes full form. Elvis creates extensive buildup with Priscilla to consummate their relationship with sex; thus priming Priscilla to link marriage with sex. Yet marriage to a man suffering from a Madonna/Whore Complex will ultimately prove to be sexless, and when children enter the equation, god forbid one defiles the mother of their wee ones! It’s no surprise that Elvis epitomizes the Madonna/Whore Complex: a complicated dedication to his mother, a revolving door of other women, and of course, a virginal wife whose sex starvation leads her to finding intimacy elsewhere (cue the random Tae Kwon Do instructor).
Yet the anticlimactic ending was a bit of a ball-buster. I wouldn’t say I hated it, as the alternative would probably consist of Elvis’s impending death, which would steal the spotlight from Priscilla. The film doesn’t end with any title cards summarizing either Priscilla nor Elvis’s fate, just a girl-boss finally learning to prioritize herself as the camera closes on her driving away from Graceland. A bit flat, but a nice message.
While Priscilla definitely doesn’t pass the Bechdel Test and I may never want to talk to another man for the rest of my life, this film successfully saves Priscilla’s legacy as she maintained in her autobiography that her relationship was “true love,” despite losing her identity to the King of Rock. So for that – thank you director dearest Coppola!
Catch ya when the credits role!
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