One of the most sought after and hot topic popstars of recent memory has been none other than the girlie of the famous stage name “Charli xcx.” She’s risen to higher heights of fame as of recent with her hit album Brat, which came out in the summer of June 2024. fast forward now at the onset of 2026, Charli takes her persona to the screen with a new film called The Moment, directed by first time feature filmmaker Aidan Zamiri. The film stars Charli herself, a slightly fictionalized version of herself who tries to navigate the ups and downs of fame during the Brat era. For context, Brat was a music phenomenon that was sensationalized beyond the album. The bright green of the album aesthetic became the backdrop for the whole summer, even having a trend to go along to deem the summer of the album’s release “Brat Summer.” It wasn’t just an album, but also a party. Her hit dance pop tunes lit the flame for many to have an enjoyable and bashful summer. While the limelight of that era all seems fun and cathartic as an artists, it also has its fair share of bumpy roads and stress in the midsts of its chaos, which is what Charli and Aidan ultimately try to express through the film.
The majority of the plot focuses on Charli herself as she tries to prepare for the Brat tour. She circulates through many aspects to make the tour a full spectacle through things like a concert film, club lit flash lighting in the venue, and more Brat coded accessories to go along with the trends. In the beginning it seems like her dream life and ideal plan for everything, when in reality its only to pander to the pressures of outside influence. One of the things about being in an industry like music heavily polluted with Collab efforts and other teams, One thing an artist is constantly fighting for is control. Control over what they want to do and how they want to do it. Throughout, the main look into Charli’s headspace is ultimately that she doesn’t know exactly how to find that control through the fog and smoke of fame, pressures for a bigger spectacle, and looking for approval. In a world as big as Brat, tons of people and labels will be looking to capitalize off of your shining moment for corporate or personal gain in any way, making your inner circle not as trustworthy as you’d want in the pressurizing limelight.
It’s a constant battle of trying to figure out whether to cater to yourself or the others waiting for you to keep the train of spectacle going as a popstar. throughout, its easy and evident to say that Charli doesn’t even for a second know what she wants for herself. Exhaustion runs high in the chugging machinery of performing for an audience, But duty also calls alas as a famous person constantly having an established reputation to hold. The Moment effectively dives into the nuances and complications of fame through a combination of the sweat soaked high life of Brat, as well as its fair share of comedic moments that come with that life. The film ultimately also brings in a fair share of comedic moments to turn the intensity down whilst still capturing that absurdity of fame pushing its limits on her. It’s also a greatly stylized effort, with brightly exposed cinematography and color grading, capturing that richly bright and obknoxious feeling of the Brat summer era.
The film is also carried on the backhand of loads of good performances. Charli xcx gives a solid first acting outing as the lead, playing a subtly nuanced version of her pop star self. Her persona in the narrative and her portrayal gives and inside scoop on the in betweens of her mind at the time, being things like irritated, angry, stressed, and even emotional at times. The range of emotions captures the full chaos and disastrous nature of her downward spiral of a breakdown during the tour prep, and a look at the tiredness that comes with constantly having to pander to an audience like money hungry execs or creative directors who truly just don’t understand your point of view. Alexander Skarsgard is a showstopper as well, playing the control freak concert film director that contributes to everyone’s spiral into madness. He’s slightly giddy and funny at times, while knowing also how to switch gears straight Into insufferable territory to fit the less satirical message the film brings towards the latter act if you will.
The movie doesn’t struggle with a big deal of things, but pacing and tonal balance at a firm level could be one thing to take this film higher and fully flesh it out from a commentary standpoint. sometimes, the film feels like its rushing through scene by scene at 70 miles an hour instead of letting you fully process. It can tend to get caught in the mix of its stressful breakneck depiction of fame in order to immerse you into Charli’s overstimulated mind, but simaltaneously forget to dive into the root cause of that stress in those instances, but rather just capitalizing off of the stressed characters and turning it into simple tension. The film if trimmed down at fast pacing, could’ve felt like a fully authentic effort to convey its message to the best possible ability instead of trying to stretch its audience length with a specific fast pace that sacrifices important deep narrative message that caters to the point of the film. All and all though, The Moment is an insightful look into the stressed and migraine inducing mind of fame, caused by an industry about highlights that can run you dry.
Rating: 4/5 stars
