A Star Is Born

About

A Star Is Born is a 2018 American musical romantic drama starring Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper. The film, directed by Cooper, features Cooper as famous singer-songwriter Jackson Maine and Lady Gaga as an unknown singer and his love interest, Ally. Upon its release in October 2018, it began generating intense hype and Oscar buzz, and reviews form previews were extremely positive.

History

A Star Is Born is a remake of the original 1937 film starring Judy Garland, which was later remade starring Barbra Streisand.^[1] Rumors of the project began circulating in 2011, when it was announced that Clint Eastwood would direct the film and it would star Beyoncé. After several rumors of stars attached the project that never came to fruition, eventually it was announced that Cooper would star in the film alongside Lady Gaga and also make his directorial debut. The film also stars Andrew Dice Clay, Dave Chappelle, and Sam Elliot in supporting roles. The trailer was released on YouTube on June 6th, 2018 (shown below).

The film premiered at the Venice Film Festival on August 31st, 2018 and is scheduled to premiere worldwide on October 5th, 2018.

Reception

Early reviews for the film were extremely positive. As of September 11th, 2018, the film has a score of 89/100 on Metacritic^[2] and a score of 95/100 on Rotten Tomatoes.^[3] After the film showed at the Toronto International Film Festival, Vanity Fair^[4] reported it "ran away with all the Oscar buzz." Variety^[5] reported that both Gaga and Cooper could be up for Oscars for the film.

Online Presence

The film generated a solid online presence prior to its release. As of September 11th, 2018, the film has over 50,000 likes on Facebook.^[6] The trailer was posted to Reddit's /r/movies and gained over 3,500 points.^[7]

Related Memes

Cooper/Gaga Dialogue Exploitable

The day the trailer was released, a moment from the trailer in which Cooper's character calls out to Lady Gaga from his car was recognized as having meme potential. Twitter user @FightOnGaga^[8] pointed it out on June 6th (shown below, left). On June 8th, a post on Gaga Daily^[9] asked for memes from the trailer, and several users posted Lady Gaga-themed versions of the Cooper/Gaga Dialogue template. Among them was a post by user @bornthatwayy that gained over 1,600 retweets and 4,300 likes (shown below, right).

After the film premiered in Venice, the format began seeing more traction on Weird Twitter with contexts that had nothing to do with Lady Gaga or the film. For example, on Sepember 1st, user @Pattymo posted a version with a factoid about Mr. Belvedere, gaining over 470 retweets and 4,300 likes (shown below, left). User @briceezell posted a football-related version on September 11th, 2018 (shown below, right).

"Why Did You Do That?"

"Why Did You Do That?" is a song from the A Star Is Born soundtrack. Unlike other, more serious songs from the soundtrack, "Why did You Do That?" is a song about how the singer finds butts attractive in cute jeans.

In context, the song is supposed to represent how the film's protagonist Ally creates a less-authentic, albeit successful, cheesy pop song. Critics were split on the song's quality. Vulture wondered, "Is it terrible, is it a bop, or is it a terrible song that’s also a bop?"^[9] Jezebel wrote, "Hear that, Jackson Maine? Ally does have something to say and it’s that cute butts drive her insane."^[10] Fans were also divided in their response to the track. User @drewariana tweeted a Worried Jay-Z GIF representing his conflicting feelings about the song (shown below, left). User @tribranchvo tweeted a Charizard and Dragonite Dance Remix to the track, gaining over 5,400 retweets and 14,000 likes (shown below, right). The Daily Dot^[11] wrote an extensive piece covering the breadth of reactions and pondering the question the song is intended to pose in the film, which is whether the cheesiness of the song prevents it from being considered "good."

Search Interest

External References