3/10

Critically Acclaimed Director, David Cronenberg presents his first feature film in three years, as he takes us through the very dark and secretive world of the Hollywood backdrop. “Maps To The Stars” follows four different characters through intertwining stories, in which they all share very horrifying secrets about their dark pasts. Stafford Weiss (John Cusack) is a famed TV self-help therapist with an A-list celebrity clientele. Meanwhile, Cristina Weiss (Olivia Williams) has her work cut out managing the career of their disaffected child-star son, Benjie (Evan Bird), a fresh graduate of rehab at age 13. Yet unbeknownst to them, another member of the Weiss family has arrived in town, mysteriously scarred and tormented Agatha (Mia Wasikowska), just released from a psych ward and ready to start again. She soon works her way into a friendship with a limo driver (Robert Pattinson) and becomes personal assistant to unraveling actress Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore), who is beset by the ghost of her legendary mother, Clarice (Sarah Gadon). Agatha is on a quest for redemption and  she’s determined to find it, no matter what it takes. Cronenberg has always been one to never be held down by any particular genre title, but it’s hard to classify his latest film based on a lack of setting tone, or bland narrative direction from characters revealed one to be worse than the other. The movie lacks any defining structure in it’s story. The main goal (If you can call it that) centers on Agatha’s journey to redemption for a troubling past, but we don’t grasp until the final shot of the film that her story is not that of an honorable one. The point of the film feels to me like almost a parody of A-list life, and to show that these celebrities are every bit as human as the people who look up to them. The acting isn’t what i would call decent even by the furthest stretch of the imagination. The movie has a great cast of actors, but i never felt like they connected to the roles they were playing. Instead of getting lost in their portrayals, i instead only saw A-list actors playing a role. The one solid performance throughout the film is that of Moore. The Best Actress winner at this year’s Oscars is playing a spoiled and bitchy character, which is so much different from anything she has ever played. There were many points in the movie where i wanted bad things to happen to this character, so job well done. The problem with Moore’s performance, as well as a stylish direction, is that the movie is marred by some very unintentionally hilarious scenes. There are a few scenes in the film where ghosts haunt our protagonists, and i didn’t have a problem with this until it became tedious and repetitive every ten minutes. If the film added something more to these scenes as the film progressed, then i wouldn’t have felt my time was being wasted for something that could’ve easily been explained in one lone scene. Sound editing/mixing is another big problem i had with the film. Once again, another movie has exemplified unbelievable scenes with it’s surrounding distractions. There is one scene that takes place in a loud bar with live music, but we hear the characters like they are in a paded room. One scene has our characters standing on the busiest road in Hollywood, and yet we only hear faint distortions of passing cars. It’s a scene that was obviously edited for sound, and it made me lose my focus on more than one account. I saved the best for last, in which there is one scene where a character is burned alive, and the CGI composition is among the very worst i have ever seen. For a film about the rich, and luxurious (Albeit spoiled) lifestyles of the people who inhabit it’s city, it’s hilarious to see a film with “Birdemic” like effects when it comes to a very important scene during the third act. The commentary on celebrity’s is certainly a refreshing idea, but it could’ve used something other than obvious rumored cliches like picking out a certain color of M&M, or bratty child stars. I’m not saying this cliche isn’t true, but it feels outdated with how far we have come on such a subject. Overall, it’s best to stay away from this one. Art house filmgoers like myself will even have a tough time trying to follow such a lack in narrative plot, especially with a payoff that had me asking more questions coming out of the film than i had during any other point of watching it. “Maps To The Stars” travels down a road creatively unpaved, and then goes off road on a detour on insane logic. Consider this map outdated.