Brevity
One Direction: This Is Us
Directed by Morgan Spurlock
Syco Entertainment, Warrior Poets, Modest Entertainment
If there was one One Direction song that would perfectly summarize One Direction: This Is Us, it would have to be "Live While We're Young."
EXTREMELY CYNICAL POST AHEAD
Among all the movie's scenes (around 60% of the film were girls screaming), what struck me the most was the camping scene where the boys gathered round a campfire and pretended to be all candid and reflective and thoughtful about their life. There were at least two scenes like this in the movie (the other being Liam and Harry fishing/hanging around, and Liam claims he thinks he'd be a factory worker or a fireman if he weren't in One Direction).
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(There is, of course, the standard what I call Lucky by Britney Spears angle--"if there is nothing missing in her life why do these tears come at night?"--angle where the trade-off between fame and living a normal life is presented, but that's basically the same script everyone in showbiz is acting out, so you're sympathetic, yeah, but not totally moved)
The campfire conversation drifts into an examination of their present success. It's pretty awesome right now--their horde of screaming pre-pubescent fans but what happens after?
One of them (I think it was Harry--or Liam?) says what matters is that from the very start, they got to do what they want to do on their own terms, and that years from now, all that will count is that they stay friends no matter what, and they are remembered as a fun group of boys who did what they want to do and had fun doing it.
I think this was the movie's most genuine scene (save for Zayn's teary-eyed phone call to his Mum, I suppose). Everything else--the backstage peeks, the on-the-road footage--have a slightly scripted feel to them. But this was the boys talking about a creeping reality that sooner or later they would have to face. They're pop stars, for crying out loud. They have an expiry date. Simon Cowell, of all people, surely knows this. And the fact that they are going through this at a very young age (18, 19, 20? I think the eldest is 22--Louis?) makes it a bit more heartbreaking.
They're at the top of their game right now, no doubt, but it's already been three years since X-Factor, and time is ticking. And they know it. Fame is fleeting, and obscurity is, well, forever.
Hashtag YOLO right there.
Pic Credits:
1. http://parentpreviews.com/legacy-pics/one-direction-this-is-us.jpg
2. http://images.sugarscape.com/userfiles/thisisuscamping(1).jpg