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Beautiful Darling: The Life and Times of Candy Darling, Andy Warhol Superstar -- Film Review
Bottom Line: Fascinating doc recalls a forgotten second-tier star and makes her story emblematic.
By Stephen Farber
February 14, 2010, 06:14 PM ET
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| "Beautiful Darling" |
Berlin -- Several of Andy Warhol's stable of performers achieved
the 15 minutes of fame promised by their guru, but one of Warhol's
pets, the transvestite performer known as Candy Darling, probably
achieved a few more than her allotted minutes before fading into
obscurity. Those who are not well versed in Warhol movies of the
1960s and '70s may not remember Darling today, but James Rasin's
incisive documentary, "Beautiful Darling," which received its world
premiere in Berlin, not only tells Darling's intriguing story but
also makes a larger comment on the lust for celebrity that is one
of the enduring, unhappy legacies of the Warhol era.
Darling was born James Slattery, a Long Island boy who always felt
like a misfit until he imagined that he might re-invent himself as
a movie star in the mold of his idol, Kim Novak. Warhol met her and
cast her in a few of his shoestring productions, along with Jackie
Curtis and Holly Woodlawn (who is still alive and is interviewed by
Rasin). Yet there was something unique about Darling. As John
Waters observes in the film, many other transvestites were freakish
whereas Darling was genuinely beautiful. Cecil Beaton and Richard
Avedon photographed her, and she starred in one of Tennessee
Williams' later plays, "Small Craft Warnings," before dying of
lymphoma in 1974 at the age of 29.
Rasin found a wealth of material about Darling from Jeremiah
Newton, her friend and roommate, who remains obsessed with Candy
some 35 years after her death. And here is where the film achieves
its most eerie and haunting resonance. If Darling created a
glamorous persona to pay homage to her favorite movie stars, Newton
has lived his life in thrall to Darling's memory. He retains her
personal belongings and conducted his own oral history of his
heroine. So the film emerges as a touching and twisted tribute to
all the lonely star-worshippers who find a measure of personal
fulfillment in their attachment to an idol.
Rasin's approach is even-handed and unsentimental, allowing us to
draw our own conclusions about the weird extremes of this movie
star infatuation. The film is skillfully edited, and Chloe Sevigny
recites passages from Candy's diaries with tenderness and aplomb.
An impressive number of insiders -- including Woodlawn, Waters,
Paul Morrissey (who directed Darling in "Flesh" and "Women in
Revolt"), Warhol Factory regulars Gerard Malanga and Taylor Mead,
and writer Fran Lebowitz -- provide telling reminiscences.
"Darling" expertly recreates a slice of the cultural history of the
'60s while also telling us something about the poisonous addiction
of fame.
Venue: Berlin International Film Festival
Director-screenwriter: James Rasin
Producers: Elizabeth Bentley, Jeremiah Newton, Gill Holland
Director of photography: Martina Radwan
Music: Gerald Busby
Editor: Zachary Stuart-Pointer
No rating, 85 minutes
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