It’s a bit of an understatement to say that David Cronenberg’s Maps to the Stars is not for everyone but that’s par for the course where the director’s work is concerned. Always one to speak his mind, good box office be damned, the filmmaker has built his reputation on pushing viewers to the edge with his extreme visions of man’s consciousness being consumed by technology (Videodrome, eXistenZ), the long term effects violence has on individuals and society (A History of Violence, Eastern Promises) and run-of-the-mill obsession (Dead Ringers, M. Butterfly).
The irony of the film’s title becomes obvious once we meet the characters and determine they have no direction at all. Spinning in their own private worlds, incapable of moving away from events in their past and refusing to look themselves square in the face and deal with their problems, these are people who’ve allowed themselves to be deluded where their true nature and worth is concerned. This is hardly exclusive of Hollywood yet the spotlight it brings to their troubles makes it all that easier, though we openly deny it, to revel in the schadenfreude of the situation. After all, isn’t that what celebrities and Tinsel Town are for?
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