Miss Americana

Miss Americana also known as Taylor Swift: Miss Americana is a 2020 American documentary film directed by Lana Wilson, that follows American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift and her life over the course of several years of her career. It was released on Netflix and in select theaters on January 31, 2020.

Miss Americana has been described as an unvarnished and emotionally revealing look at Swift, during a metamorphic phase in her life, as she learns to accept her role as not only a singer-songwriter and entertainer, but as an influential woman “harnessing the full power of her voice”. The film is set in the time period spanning from Swift’s 2018 concert tour Reputation Stadium Tour to the release roll-out of her 2019 studio album Lover, dotted with flashback clips portraying several undisclosed events of Swift’s life and career.

The film debuted at the opening night of 2020 Sundance Film Festival on January 23, 2020, to critical acclaim centering on its intimacy and vulnerability. It also became the highest-rated Netflix-original biographical documentary by a recording artist in IMDb history. Accompanying the film’s release, “Only the Young”, a song by Swift featured in the end credits, was released as a promotional single. The film was named by the National Board of Review as one of the five best documentaries of 2020. Publications have listed Miss Americana amongst many best films and documentaries lists.

Synopsis

Miss Americana follows Swift during a transitional phase in her career, as she wraps up her 2018 Reputation Stadium Tour and began creating her 2019 album Lover, while covering several years of her life through a biographical compilation of interviews, flashbacks, studio footage, home videos, cellphone videos and concert recordings. It focuses on sensitive subjects that Swift often avoided in interviews, such as her past battle with body dysmorphia and eating disorder, her mother’s cancer diagnosis, the toxic internet culture and media scrutiny she faces, her sexual assault trial, and decision to go public with her political views, including LGBTQ+ allyship.

Netflix described the film as a “raw and emotionally revealing look” at Swift “during a transformational period in her life as she learns to embrace her role not only as a songwriter and performer, but as a woman harnessing the full power of her voice”. The Sundance Institute outlined: “Director Lana Wilson offers a multifaceted window into Swift, her creative process, and her singular experience of being one of the brightest lights on the world’s global stage. Showcasing Swift’s trademark vulnerability and her fierce intelligence and wit, Wilson captures moments both tender and exhilarating as the superstar embarks on the latest chapter of her already extraordinary career.”

Cast

• Taylor Swift
• Andrea Swift, mother
• Scott Swift, father
• Abigail Anderson Lucier, friend
• Tree Paine, publicist
• Robert G. Allen, manager
• Joe Alwyn, actor and boyfriend
• Jack Antonoff, record producer
• Joel Little, record producer
• Max Martin, record producer
• Dave Meyers, music video director
• Brendon Urie, musician
• Todrick Hall, musician
• Paul Sidoti, guitarist
• Kamilah Marshall, singer
• Melanie Nyema, singer

Additionally, the archive footages used in the documentary feature record producer Calvin Harris, singers Beyoncé, P!nk, Harry Styles, Shakira and Lenny Kravitz, music bands Dixie Chicks and Earth Wind & Fire, models Karlie Kloss and Kim Kardashian, rapper Kanye West, US senator Marsha Blackburn, US president Donald Trump, actors Taylor Lautner and Tom Hiddleston, drag queens Jade Jolie and Riley Knoxx, television personalities Barbara Walters, Dan Harris, David Letterman, Erin Robinson, Graham Norton, Hoda Kotb, Jedediah Bila, Jenny Johnson, Jimmy Fallon, JuJu Chang, Nancy O’Dell, Nikki Glaser, Phil McGraw, Sara Haines, Stephen Colbert, Sunny Hostin, Whoopi Goldberg, and the entire “Fab 5” cast of Queer Eye: Antoni Porowski, Bobby Berk, Karamo Brown, Jonathan Van Ness and Tan France.

Background

Swift expressed interest in making a documentary with Netflix following the concert film Taylor Swift: Reputation Stadium Tour, which premiered on the streaming platform in December 2018. She was provided with a list of potential directors, of which Wilson was one. Wilson began filming at the end of the Reputation album and tour cycle, and joined Swift for recording sessions of her subsequent album Lover.

The title of the documentary is borrowed from “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince”, the seventh track on Lover, in which Swift expressed her disillusionment over the current state of United States politics.

Swift revealed the documentary in November 2019, when she said the owner and founder of her former label Big Machine Records, Scooter Braun and Scott Borchetta respectively, blocked her from using older music and performance footage for the documentary. She added that the documentary does not mention Braun, Borchetta, or Big Machine. Big Machine denied the accusations in a statement. In response, a representative for Swift published an email from a Big Machine executive refusing to issue licences in connection to the documentary. In December, Variety reported Big Machine had cleared the use of Swift’s older material for the film.

Needing to speak up about beliefs I’d always had, because it felt like an opportunity to shed light on what those trials are like. I experienced it as a person with extreme privilege, so I can only imagine what it’s like when you don’t have that. And I think one theme that ended up emerging in the film is what happens when you are not just a people pleaser but someone who’s always been respectful of authority figures, doing what you were supposed to do, being polite at all costs. I still think it’s important to be polite, but not at all costs. Not when you’re being pushed beyond your limits, and not when people are walking all over you. I needed to get to a point where I was ready, able and willing to call out bullshit rather than just smiling my way through it.

— Swift, “Taylor Swift: No Longer ‘Polite at All Costs'”, Variety

In December 2019, Netflix revealed that the documentary was set to premiere at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. In an interview with Chris Willman of Variety, it was revealed that the opening act of the film deals with “juxtaposing the joys of creation with the aggravations of global stardom” while the second half is a “provocative turn focused on why Swift became a political animal”. Willman wrote that the film further features clips capturing Swift’s increasing LGBTQ allyship, Swift’s reaction to her mother’s cancer diagnosis, and Swift’s response to her 2017 album Reputation not receiving any nominations in general categories at the 2019 Grammy Awards. Wilson stated that she views the movie as “looking at the flip side of being America’s sweetheart”, meant to shed light on the less-glamorous side of fame and stardom.

Promotion

On January 15, 2020, Swift revealed the release date and a poster of the film through her social media accounts. Six days later, an official trailer to the film was released on YouTube and on Swift’s social media accounts. On January 30, Swift announced the list of select theatres that will play Miss Americana, for a limited time. It includes 25 Alamo Drafthouse theatres and an iPic theatre in the United States, and the Prince Charles Cinema in the United Kingdom.

Music

The documentary includes the song “Only the Young”, playing during the end credits, which was released as a promotional single alongside the film. The song was written by Swift after the 2018 United States elections, but did not make it on the track-list of Lover. Upon release, the song received universal acclaim from music critics, who praised its politically charged lyrics that deal with gun violence and school shootings in the United States. “Only the Young” debuted and peaked at number one on the US Billboard Digital Song Sales chart, and entered the charts in several other countries.

Critical reception

Miss Americana was met with critical acclaim upon release. On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a “certified fresh” approval rating of 91% based on 91 reviews, with an average rating of 7.36/10. The site’s critics consensus reads: “Miss Americana provides an engaging if somewhat deliberately opaque backstage look at a pop star turned cultural phenomenon.” On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 65 out of 100, based on 23 critics, indicating “generally favorable reviews”.

After premiering at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, the film received critical praise and a standing ovation from the audience. Miss Americana has been described as an “intimate”, “genuine”, “funny” and “empowering” film, that documents “her humble beginnings as a country-music star to her position as an influential figure in pop culture”. Critics complimented the film for Wilson’s direction, and the “emotional heft” that came from Swift’s vulnerable interviews discussing issues such as eating disorder, self esteem and sexual assault, and also for the portrayal of Swift’s creative process.

Wesley Morris of The New York Times chose Miss Americana as his “critic’s pick”, describing the film as “85 minutes of translucence” with Swift, stating that she is “self-critical, grown up and ready, perhaps, to deliver a message beyond the music”. Nancy Coleman, of the same journal, opined that the film “opens a rare, honest window on what makes this star tick”. Hannah Woodhead of Little White Lies opined that the film offers “unprecedented access to the notoriously private singer and her dizzying world” through “interviews, studio footage, home videos and concert recordings”. She described the film as “glossy, conventional, flicking between past and present with a warm intimacy” as Swift “bares her soul in this intimate, earnest docu-portrait”. Slash Film‘s Chris Evangelita termed the film as a “dynamite crowd pleaser” and described it as “a sweet, surprisingly funny portrait of Taylor Swift growing up and getting political”. Leslie Felperin of The Hollywood Reporter wrote “what’s ultimately very endearing about Swift is her intelligence and self-awareness, qualities that also make her music compelling, sophisticated and capable of appealing both to adolescent kids and hipster musicologists”. Writing for The Salt Lake Tribune, Sean Means stated that the film is “an eye-opening look at Taylor Swift finding a new voice” and “shows Swift as an artist and activist just warming up for the next act”. Amber Wilkinson of The Times wrote that the “intimate and open” documentary offers “a much more personal and open consideration of a star who has always been known for her onstage sound and who is now finding her political voice off stage too”.

The Atlantic‘s Spencer Kornhaber wrote that Miss Americana portrays “a pop star facing a daunting challenge—redefining success”, acting as “a container for the dictates of supposedly meritocratic capitalist patriarchy”. He added that the film does not depict a “drastic change” but rather “a tough, somewhat deflating process of self-recognition”. Decider‘s Anna Menta commented that “Wilson and her team captured moments that felt personal, vulnerable, and deeply authentic, and they did so with a skill and artistry that Instagram Live stories just can’t match”. Steve Pond of TheWrap pointed out that “the heart of Miss Americana is Taylor Swift telling us what she stands for on gay rights and women’s rights, and what she’s learned about the fate of being a woman in the public eye”. Glamour‘s Marie-Claire Chappet wrote: “Miss Americana shows Taylor is sick of the restrictive parameters set out for women in the spotlight. She defies her advisors and gets political — breaking her silence and following in the footsteps of the Dixie Chicks – with thankfully less damaging consequences. She begins using her voice for what she cares about – like LGBTQ rights – and stops caring if Twitter thinks she’s over – if the industry doesn’t think she’s ‘likeable’.” The New Yorker‘s Amanda Petrusich concluded that the “beautiful” film is “far more interesting than any acceptance speech, red-carpet interview, or paparazzi photo”. In his critic’s pick review, IndieWire‘s David Ehrlich wrote that “the power of Miss Americana” is “watching someone who stands astride the world gradually realize that her art is the only thing that she can control”, adding that Wilson is “so good at splitting the difference that some of her documentary’s most humanizing moments are beautiful for how they contradict Swift’s intention”. He concluded that “it’s truly enough to make you feel like an asshole for ever thinking that Swift was some kind of Aryan crypto-fascist, and not just a mega-famous young woman who didn’t yet love herself enough to be hated for her convictions”.

In a two-star review for The Guardian, Benjamin Lee describes Miss Americana as “too stage-managed” and a “brand management dressed up as insight”. Nick Allen for RogerEbert.com describes the film as “engineered to appease her fans and promote Swift’s self-awareness”. Mike Ryan of Uproxx wrote that the movie is “frustrating” due to its “lack of depth when discussing interesting issues”, instead opting for “montages of victories”. Beth Webb of Empire opined that “nothing new seems to break through her barriers” in the documentary. Variety‘s Owen Gleiberman opined that the documentary is “a controlled and sanded-off confection of pop-diva image management”, where Swift “presents of herself is just chancy and sincere enough” in the film “to draw us in”.