Culture

Rating: 3/5

Sometimes real life events feel like they happened purely in order to be made into movies. The Hollywood Hills burglaries of 2009 were one of those events. A bunch of teenagers robbing the houses of celebrities is clearly the premise for a great film, and the stage was well set for natural narrative flow, thematic significance and deep character complexity. All of these attributes are inherent to the story, and yet Sophia Coppola somehow manages to turn it into a very average film.

For those unfamiliar with the Hollywood Hills robberies, a group of teenagers used celebrity gossip websites (such as Perez Hilton) to find out when celebrities would be out of town and then broke into their homes and stole a variety of items – primarily money and clothes. Coppola tells this story from the perspective of the only boy implicated in the crimes: Nick Prugo. Through his eyes we see the situation escalate from petty theft to mass robberies, and finally to the groups’ eventual arrest and prosecution.

Coppola’s direction and writing somehow turn this story into an exercise in self-indulgence. Instead of elaborating the relationships between characters, or further investigating the psychological effects of their activities, Coppola instead opts for extended (and pointless) shots of characters listening to music and smoking. She even manages to make the burglaries themselves a painful and drawn-out experience to watch. While the initial robbery is exciting, every subsequent robbery is filmed in the exact same way. By the fifth or sixth time, this becomes very boring.

Despite Coppola’s poor direction, the richness of the content often shines through. In particular, the themes of celebrity-envy and excess (which are central to the story) stand out boldly, making you cringe over the destructive and malignant culture that has sprung up out of Hollywood.

Though the film co-stars Emma Watson, it is the performances by Nick (Israel Broussard) and Rachel (Katie Chang) that leave an impression. These two previously unknown actors put Emma Watson and her barely-passable Californian accent to shame.

If you can look past Coppola’s direction the film is worth watching, if only to learn more about this extraordinary true story.