Jennifer Lopez has continuously been smitten by genuineness.
It’s there in her music, just like the 2014 single “Same lady,” the radio sensation “I’m Real” with Ja Rule and her signature bop “Jenny From the Block.” within the latter, a woman from The Bronx makes the solemn promise: “No matter wherever i'm going, i do know wherever I came from.” It’s additionally been parceled out in her film roles, several of them rags-to-riches fairytales that emphasize each her shrewdness and supreme glamour, like “Maid in Manhattan,” “Second Act” and, last, “Marry Me.”
So the prospect of her all-access documentary – Netflix’s “Halftime,” that opened this year’s Tribeca festival and debuts on the streamer nowadays – not solely makes excellent sense for J. Lo-the-brand however additionally suggests her larger obligation to the reality as she enters the fourth decade of an amazing career in show biz. apparently, though, the Lopez mythology we’ve return to understand appears rote learning compared to the $64000 bombshell of the doc: that international superstars aren't resistant to crushing defeat, as proven by her failure to secure Associate in Nursing accolade nomination for Associate in Nursing acclaimed flip within the 2019 drama “Hustlers.”
On the petty byways of Hollywood, contusioned egos and anger over a star’s inability to induce awards attention is rarely spoken of in public. it's gossiped concerning at endless For Your thought lunches and cocktail parties, over beautiful cluster text threads and at gay brunches across subway la (including mine, to be real). The figure of actors being “humbled and honored simply to be nominated” is therefore pervasive that award show presenters have crafted musical numbers thrusting fun at its tactical maneuver.
But in “Halftime,” Lopez is deeply vulnerable in discussing what that accolade nomination would have meant to her – acknowledgment from an inventive institution that has not traditionally accepted her pop star ambitions and splashy public romances.
Directed by Amanda Micheli, “Halftime” masterfully creates a subplot around Lopez’s momentum as a competition for best supporting player prizes. within the film’s 1st ten minutes, we tend to see Lopez set expectations as each a producer and star of “Hustlers,” concerning Associate in Nursing opportunist ring of exotic dancers UN agency robbed their underwriter purchasers once the 2008 money crash.
The day once the “Hustlers” performance at the 2019 provincial capital International festival, Lopez is seen {in a|during a|in Associate in Nursing exceedingly|in a very} hair and makeup chair prepping for an intense spherical of press. Her manufacturing partner, Elaine Goldsmith-Thomas, phones in with the primary spherical of “Hustlers” reviews.
“Jennifer Lopez dominates in an exceedingly quintessentially yankee story,” Goldsmith-Thomas oozes through a phone, capping it off with, “Jennifer Lopez is accolade worthy.” The star’s face crumbles into infantile excitement, then quickly dissolves into paranoid superstitious notion.
“We’re on our thanks to the accolade,” one glam squad member says because the assemblage heads out for the press day.
“Stop!” Lopez commands. “See? You’re creating Maine nervous.”
In various interviews over the years, Lopez has same that her film career was front-loaded with status roles — “Out of Sight” and her gaolbreak “Selena” being the foremost notable. however administrators like film producer and Steven Soderbergh stopped job once her platinum-selling music career launched (and with it, fashion lines and fragrances and alternative remunerative whole opportunities that usually conflict with high art). In one tribute, “Hustlers” director Lorene Scafaria same, “maybe as a result of she’s created exertions look therefore easy for thus long, it’s straightforward to require Jennifer Lopez with a pinch of salt. I’m therefore proud she’s obtaining the popularity she deserves.” The doc additionally goes out of its thanks to directly quote awards pundits questioning aloud that Lopez could seem an excessive amount of sort of a celebrity to award acting’s greatest prize in earnest.
This white-knuckle ride of can or won’t she ascend the accolade stage follows Lopez through most of the film. although alternative, a lot of of import life events play out — her Super Bowl fifty-four intermission show performance, for instance, that was watched by a lot of viewers than the last 5 accolade telecasts combined — they don’t appear to hold constant emotional weight with the lady from The Bronx.
“There’s a full circuit around awards season that I had ne'er done before. it really becomes a campaign. if you don’t have intercourse, they create you are feeling such as you don’t have an opportunity,” Lopez tells her documentarian, with real distress in her voice.
Her journey continues down a well-worn path to accolade glory that a lot of trade insiders can recognize: a spotlight award at the Palm Springs International festival, then the elation of a Golden Globe nomination (which definitely dates this doc, considering that group’s implosion within the time since “Hustlers” created its rounds).
On the eve of the Golden Globes, several of constant glam squad and supporters from provincial capital and Lopez’s entire career packed a collection at the Beverly Hilton, solely to observe her lose resolute Laura Dern for “Marriage Story.”
Entering the suite with Goldsmith-Thomas once the loss, Lopez and old manager Benny Medina fight down tears as they embrace.
“I very thought I had an opportunity,” Lopez says. “I desire I let everyone down.”
For fans viewing Lopez on magazine covers, or peers and media players witnessing her float between afterparties and power lunches, these area unit the personal moments we’ve solely ever speculated over. shortly within the documentary, simply before the accolade snub is bimanual down, Lopez breaks into tears from her bed, reading a piece from Glamour magazine.
“Frankly, it’s thrilling to visualize a reprehensively underrated performer… “ Lopez reads concerning herself, before obtaining obstructed up, “get her due from status film shops.”
It’s not the unsmooth ride on the vi train into Manhattan, the one Lopez would go for audition for dance gigs in her youth, however it’s her reality. And it’s deeply revealing.