“Lola” starring Nicola Peltz has garnered quite a bit of attention due to it being controversial. “Lola” follows the tragic story of a young woman who works multiple jobs, one being stripping/prostitution, as she desperately tries to make enough money to get her and her young sibling out of their abusive home. The synopsis makes the movie sound pretty good, so I was curious to watch it to understand why there was so much hate for it.
First, you have to know some background on the makers of the film. Mainly, Nicola Peltz Beckham, who plays Lola, but also wrote and directed the movie. If you’re not familiar with her background, allow me to explain. Peltz is the heiress to a billion-dollar fortune from her father and was brought up with extreme wealth and privilege. She has married into the Beckham family who are also incredibly rich and famous. Now, this is in no way to say those with wealth can’t struggle; however, their struggles most likely don’t look anything like hose of Lola’s.
The complete lack of experiences anywhere near the realm of Lola’s from the creator of this film is abundantly clear. It seems not 15 minutes goes by before another extreme tragedy overtakes Lolas’ life, but only momentarily before our angel of a protagonist overcomes it.
It was clear in multiple scenes that the person who stars in this film is the same person who directed it. There are multiple scenes of Lola sitting solemnly, doing her makeup, or another activity that allows the viewers to appreciate her beauty and acting skills. It feels like we’re being told to appreciate how strongly she can express silent sadness, but it came off as an inability to through dialogue or in more complex scenes. While some other acting was commendable, most of the characters functioned the same way, as pawns to add more tragedy to Lola’s life.
She discusses poverty but ultimately, everything works out as if poverty is something you can conquer easily. She manages to get out of her hometown despite nothing changing from the beginning to the end to allow her to fulfill her dream of leaving. It was abundantly clear that Peltz had zero interest in trying to learn about and understand what life is like for someone in the situations she put Lola in. We don’t get to ponder the implications of how one escapes poverty since it was clear that Peltz had no interest in that aspect as it provides nothing aesthetic or easy.
There has also been controversy over the final act of the film, since it is interpreted as very pro-life. While I think it can be viewed otherwise, it does seem to imply a simplistic view on the matter that pro-life people typically opt for. It completely glosses over the horrid manner of the conception, making it incredibly easy to ignore that and be happy for her for starting anew. It’s implied that her pregnancy magically gets her jobs allowing her to ultimately leave, which I can only imagine is incredibly unrealistic for someone actually in a similar situation. In reality, deciding to keep a pregnancy when you’re in a similar situation would be nowhere near as easy as it was for her. It feels as though Peltz is trying to convince people that everyone who actually is impoverished and struggling is able to easily pull themselves up from their bootstraps.
There are multiple aspects of wanting to supposedly represent these struggles without actually putting the effort into the difficult parts. It’s very easy to write somebody doing drugs and being addicted to them, but harder to show them in withdrawal, which we see none of from Lola, who quit cold turkey. The same is said for death, sexual assault, lack of money, and cheating.
What sets this movie apart from others is the complete lack of a genuine attempt to tell a real story. I won’t argue that every movie you make has to be in line with your life experience, but when you make such a ridiculous attempt to tell a story that’s the complete opposite of your own, you’re going to get backlash for it if you don’t put the time and energy into really understanding what you’re trying to explain to others. For this reason, it came off as very offensive and pretentious.
Ultimately, what I think happened is what happens to just about every aspiring filmmaker. They struggle to write and film anything that invokes emotion and can’t think of any ideas, so they think of the saddest things they can and try to do something like that. The difference is most people aren’t billionaires who can finance and make a movie like this. Given that I watched the whole movie, I can’t say it was unwatchable, and it’s worth taking into account that this was the first movie made by Peltz, who will hopefully learn from her many mistakes and try to tell a story that she’s capable of telling.
Great article!