West Side Story
Screenplay: A
West Side Story is a story old as time. It’s been sixty years since the original film was released, sixty four years since the musical premiered on Broadway, and roughly 425 years (depending on whom you cite) since Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet, the play which West Side Story is more than loosely based upon. It’s about two gangs - the Jets and the Sharks - both stuck on the wrong side of the poverty line. When they mix they don’t mix particularly well, which leads to some killer drama when Tony the Jet and Maria the Shark fall in love at first sight.
If you love the original, you’ll love that all the music remains essentially untouched. The dialogue is all new. I haven’t seen the original in about thirty years, so I can’t tell you that it’s any better. But I can tell you it’s good. It feels updated in a way that highlights our current divisions while remaining true to the story’s specific conflict between the poor whites and first generation Puerto Rican immigrants of New York City.
Acting: A-
Rachel Zegler stars as Maria. My teenage son told me what a big deal this is since she was discovered after becoming a YouTube sensation. I’m not so old that I don’t know that people become stars by making YouTube videos, but last week I was too old to have any idea of how that actually works. I still don’t completely get it, but I watched her performance of “Into the Shallows” and completely understand what Steven Spielberg saw in her. She likely won’t be nominated for an Oscar this year like fellow “In the Shallow” singer Lady Gaga was. But she shows enough talent to make me think I should probably bet on it happening at some point. It’s an incredible debut performance.
Movies need a world inhabited by other people for your lead performers to move through. That world often makes or breaks a movie. This movie is most definitely made, not broken, by the supporting players. David Alvarez charms and smolders as Bernardo. Mike Faist is riveting as Riff. Ariana DeBose slays as Anita. And the original Anita, Rita Moreno, is more phenomenal than most humans could ever hope to be as Doc. They and the rest of the cast are the real treasure of this film.
Craft: A+
I want you to imagine being kidnapped by Steven Spielberg. You’re blindfolded, whisked away on a private jet (no snacks provided), and dropped off in the middle of a foreign city you’ve never been in before. How long would it take to really get to know the place? I don’t mean knowing where you can get a meal, spend the night, find a shower. I mean the amount of time to truly understand the vibe of the people and the place they all live in.
I’ve never heard of Spielberg actually kidnapping anybody, but this is what happens at the beginning of every movie. The theater lights go out, and you’re suddenly launched into a world you know nothing about (unless it’s a sequel or you’ve watched the trailer 187 times). Spielberg is a master of showing you every single important thing about the place he’s dropped you into in ten minutes or less. Raiders of the Lost Ark does this better than any movie in history. Watch it. It’s awesome. (Possible Easter Egg: the enormous wrecking ball in the opening drone shot of West Side Story looks suspiciously like the giant boulder that chases Indiana Jones and his trusty fedora through the ancient Peruvian cave).
Like Raiders, Spielberg lets you know exactly where you are in the first ten minutes of West Side Story. These are electric minutes intended to make sure the audience is fully charged for the rest of the film. Spielberg makes this happen by filling every frame with motion. The actors barely stop moving. And in their rare moments of standing still, the camera glides across the set, sending everyone flying around the frame. It’s this motion that grabs your attention, grounds you in a new place, and dares you not to follow these characters wherever they go.
Subtitles (elective class): A+
There is a lot of spoken Spanish, much more than the original. Spielberg intentionally skips the subtitles for this film, and I can’t support him more for his decision. Subtitles would “center” the English speaking audience. That means that the filmmakers would be telling the world that this film is meant for English speakers, and not so subtly letting everyone else know that they don’t really care if you don’t understand the dialogue. It would be like a theater saving the front rows for English speaking people and having Spanish speakers sit in the lobby.
Making the story just for English speakers would imply that the English speakers in the movie (the Jets) are the heroes. It might not be so obvious to the English speaking audience, but Spanish speakers would quickly pick up the fact that the Sharks were considered above the Jets. That feeling would then extend to the audience feeling that they themselves were beneath the English speaking audience. The story is much better and truer to life when both the Jets and the Sharks are treated with similar levels of dignity. But much more importantly, Spielberg treats everyone in the world who takes the time to watch his film with similar levels of dignity. He treats them as if they matter. Which of course, they do.
Final Comments:
Spielberg does the unthinkable. He takes one of an ever-dwindling handful of movies considered “untouchable” and does a remake. On one hand, I’m impressed. The movie is fabulous. I loved it.
But on the other hand, I worry. Sure, it worked out this time. But this is Steven flippin’ Spielberg. What happens when some ya-hoo tries their own Citizen Kane? Or Pulp Fiction? Or, dear God and sweet fancy Moses … Star Wars?!? I’m not sure this is a road I want to go down, but you can’t argue with Spielberg’s results. The new West Side Story is lights out fantastic. Perhaps nothing should be truly sacred.
West Side Story tells us that love can bring us together. It also says that using love as an excuse to tear us further apart will only lead to further misery. It’s a lesson we needed way back in Shakespeare’s time, and one we apparently still need to hear. Hopefully, Spielberg’s magnificent telling of West Side Story can help it stick.