Paula’s Pop Week: Envy of J. Lo!

When I started writing about music, or in general, rants were all the rage. It was hip to reject things in principle and absolutely and to throw around the toughest possible words. As a 20-year-old who has always been one of the uncool people and now sensed the chance to shoot back, I thought that was great. Rips are fun. But what’s also fun is the adulation. The in-between is the difficult part. Now I think I’m too happy or something and I’m trying to “get something out of” a lot of things. If it doesn’t work out, I prefer to say: “Well, it’s just not my thing, but treat yourself, maybe I’ll like it someday.” Unless something makes me so angry and desperate because I think it’s basically POLITICALLY bad that I still have to have. Sometimes I try really, really, really long, God knows why. That’s how I felt about – long story short – the new album by…

Jennifer Lopez – THIS IS ME NOW

So if you don’t have anything good to say about something, you shouldn’t say anything at all, wise people always say in movies. So I really want to say ALMOST NOTHING about this album. And not about the film that came out about it either. And about the documentary about the film about the album, which is also available. J. Lo is trying so hard. She even paid 20 million out of her own pocket for the film, but luckily for her, Prime Video bought it from her in the end. The album, film and documentary are somehow about their search for love and then that you first have to find it within yourself – in order to then get Mr. Right, Ben Affleck. Then something about healing the inner child and zodiac signs.

She tells (documentary) everything in front of the camera as if she were a guest at Hotel Matze, even though it’s not about anything big. Two good things: The zodiac signs are played (film) by superstars: Jane Fonda, Sofia Vergara, Trevor Noah, Keke Palmer, Kim Petras and – my highlight – Post Malone (he’s a super cute Leo). Fat Joe is J. Lo’s therapist, that’s a fun idea. Unfortunately, no one funny was involved in writing the dialogue, so it’s often just funny ideas. In the documentary for the film, Lopez says she wants to prove something, you don’t quite understand what – maybe that she is athletic, she is often shown doing sports.

Somehow it seems to me that she’s doing too well and maybe she’s a bit bored… Envy… I couldn’t help but think: “I’d like to have your problems!” She sings in a song (from the album) “It ain’t all hearts and flowers” ​​– Mouse, we know that. In the documentary she also talks about the trauma of her childhood: she was the middle child and felt she wasn’t paid enough attention to. Okay, J.Lo. I wish you ALL THE BEST on your future journey. And I’d rather listen to THIS IS ME…THEN (2002) again, there were a lot of hits on it. Now of course I ask myself again, is it me? Why do you like some albums and not others? I don’t think people necessarily get worse the longer their careers last (maybe it’s just being rich sometimes)… Do you like old things just for nostalgia? It remains a mystery. In any case, I don’t want to skip any song on the 2002 album, but unfortunately I don’t want to skip all of the songs on the sequel. But decide for yourself!

Private Berlinale

“Bob Marley: One Love”

In addition to Lopez’s hundred new films, I’ve also seen a hundred more – I’m just a cinephile. At the film “Bob Marley: One Love”, the cinema was almost empty, but there were a few teenagers in there who – I assume – knew someone who worked in the cinema and therefore didn’t pay ten euros for admission like we did. And because of this, their eating didn’t stop. At a certain point I even checked my hair to make sure it hadn’t thrown popcorn into it. I once asked if they couldn’t just be quiet – I’m a complete idiot, I was 15 myself, at that age you don’t respect anyone you don’t exactly fit in with. In the end, one of them ruined the mood by saying, “Huh, he just had to have his toe cut off.” It’s funny when you tell it.

But otherwise the film was very nice, it’s mainly about the EXODUS album, the 1976 peace concert and Marley’s (Kingsley Ben-Adir) marriage to Rita (Lashana Lynch) – finally, finally, finally a woman isn’t made into a marginal figure , but has space and is three-dimensional (unfortunately the Wailers get the short end of the stick). The portrayal of the relationship is particularly successful in a scene in which Rita and Bob argue and you see the two of them on stage shortly afterwards – he sings to her during “No Woman, No Cry” and she disappears into the shadows.

“Miller’s Girl”

Then I HAD to see the following film, “Miller’s Girl,” so that you don’t have to, please, because – attention Rant! – it really is the worst shit. I saw the trailer a few weeks ago and couldn’t believe it: Jenna Ortega plays a student who wants to seduce her teacher (Martin Freeman) for a short story in the style of (I’m not making this up) Henry Miller. What sounds like the wet dream of a pseudo-left 30-year-old guy trying to convince you to be sex-positive when you were in your early 20s is unfortunately not intended as satire – a hope that I had until the end of the film. I was waiting for the big denouement, the twist (at one point it’s even hinted at with a monologue from the girl), but no. This 18-year-old really wants to destroy the man’s life – a story that is reproduced again and again, along with this miserable Lolita myth.

As if we hadn’t already suffered enough from “Léon – The Professional” and similar crap. Countless cases of abuse that have been uncovered since #Metoo at the latest – and we are still being told stories about “overly mature” teenagers (looking like a girl, acting manipulatively like a woman, being ready to fuck like the objectified ones in men’s browser history) while adult men Boys are allowed to stay in it or animals have no sense. Of course, teacher Miller also has an alcoholic, cynical wife at home and would have liked to be a writer himself. So the path inevitably had to lead to abuse – because yes, he even kisses the student. So he actually deserves his punishment! Nevertheless, SHE comes out as the bad one, she provoked it with a thin, white dress and could she please keep quiet about it now? Holy shit, I don’t even want to link a trailer here, it’s all so crap.

“Poor Things”

Then I also saw “Poor Things” and that finished me off. The film is of course better than “Miller’s Girl”, but I just don’t want to see any more women with black Disney hair portrayed as girls who act very delicate and weak, but then (surprisingly!!!) have it all behind the ears I can’t do this anymore.

Speaking of which. Natassja Kinski is currently fighting to ensure that nude scenes of her from a crime scene for which she was abused in 1977 (as a 15-year-old!) are no longer allowed to be broadcast. Heroine! Side fact: The actress Sue Lyon, who plays the protagonist in the film “Lolita” (Stanley Kubrik), was only 14 at the time. She later said: “My destruction as a human being goes back to this film.” It’s all so bad .

Kim Petras!

While I was just upset about sex positivism nonsense, I’m now coming (!) to Kim Petras anyway. At least there is consensus here. “Fuckin’ this Fuckin’ That”, “Get Fucked”, “Rim Job”, “Butt Slutt” and “Can We Fuck” are the names of songs from their new album, SLUT POP MIAMI, the second SLUT POP album. A few American fans, who know her primarily through her feature with Sam Smith, are currently shocked on the Internet. Although of course there are slutty songs on all their albums, “Hit It From The Back”, “Coconuts”, “Treat Me Like A Ho” and so on and immediately.

I love all of this in her case because it’s so over the top, because you can’t pretend to misunderstand something (like we always had to do in the noughties when Britney, Christina or Shakira said something super “ambiguous” and then explained at length in interviews that it really wasn’t all that much about sex for them). At Petras, people fuck and how. And even though I’m really not into mainstream porn aesthetics, Petras is so funny that it works for me – and most of all, she’s just the current Queen of Pop. Nobody has released more BANGER in recent years than them. You can blast through SLUT POP MIAMI in one piece (it’s only 25 minutes long) and never get bored.

My favorite:

Now it happened that on Tuesday she came to my Cologne, no, her Cologne, she is from here! She should – huh? – occur in palladium. A hall with poor sound, limited visibility and a capacity of just 4,000 people? Our STAR from overseas??? But actually – at the concert she said in German that now sounded strange – it was her first sold-out concert in Cologne. We don’t deserve you, Queen. She punished it afterwards with a bit of shadyness: “You can become anything you want. I’m from around here too…” Cologne – a place you have to get out of, haha. Oh well.

But funny things happened on the way to the hall. Palladium and E-Werk are opposite each other. Olli Schulz was supposed to be playing at the E-Werk at the same time. On the way there you could tell by the smell who was going where. Later we saw cap boys with little Becks on one side and queer mice with crazy energy drinks on our side. Afterwards there was another fight, sluts against sluts. Fun. After all, nobody in either fan group has any muscles. One more thing about the concert: it was good! The stage was simply too small for Kim Petras. Next time it will hopefully be upgraded, at least to Lanxess, Mercedes Benz and Co.

Bye, your throat goat!

What happened until now? Here is an overview of all the pop column texts.