Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour Review: A Breathtaking Stage Spectacle Rendered Slightly Less Spectacular On Film
In our ever-fracturing pop cultural landscape, very few things exist in the monoculture, where their omnipresence is something to either gravitate towards or run away from as fast as possible. Right now, Taylor Swift probably stands atop that mountain, and her record-breaking, monumental stadium show "The Eras Tour" is her victory lap. My relationship with Swift has evolved quite a lot over time. In the beginning, I didn't really pay much attention. This wasn't due to some knee-jerk aversion to her or her music. I have just never really been on the pulse of contemporary music, which is something I continuously try to rectify. So, I missed out on her country-girl roots and transition to full-on pop music. I knew of her as a public figure, and considering I could not care less about a celebrity's personal life, it was easy to tune out.
In the last few years, though, I thought it was finally time to dig into what all the hubbub was about, and I came to find myself enjoying the vast majority of what I was hearing, be it the pop perfection of "1989," the sleekly sophisticated storytelling of "Folklore" and "Evermore," or the teenage yearning of "Fearless." I'm still not invested in who she's dating or deciphering the cryptic messages in her music videos, but if she puts out a new record, I'll go buy it.
My relationship with her music has always been purely through the records, though. I've never been to one of her shows or seen the concert films of previous tours, like "Speak Now" or "1989." I've even only seen a couple of her music videos. Walking into "Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour," I didn't know really what to expect outside of the much-reported large-scale spectacle and that there'd be songs from every single album. The extravagance, if anything, is being undersold.
A dizzying spectacle like no other
Stretched across nearly three hours and about 40 songs, "The Eras Tour" clusters songs from her albums out of chronological order, but just about every number receives its own unique production element, from costume changes to large set pieces to — at one point — a group of backup dancers riding "TRON"-style light cycles. The stage features a gigantic screen at one end and the seemingly endless thrust of the stage is like a screen unto itself. Then there's Swift herself, usually donned in a leotard covered in the most sequins you have ever seen, strutting and skipping all around the stage in complete command of her thousands upon thousands of screaming fans. In the room (or the massive stadium), it must have been a truly breathtaking experience.
On the big screen, however, something gets a little lost. The film was directed by Sam Wrench, whose directorial career mostly consists of filmed concert performances, and although that may be his background, I don't feel he does this show a ton of favors. Very few of the shots in "Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour" come across as carefully designed. Instead, most of the time it feels like they packed SoFi Stadium to the gills with cameras to shoot a ton of footage and hoped they would find the look in the editing process, which just so happened to feature six different editors to accommodate the two-month turnaround time from these shows being performed to the release of the film.
The result is that the majority of the movie is a medium single on Swift from several different angles. You get glimpses of the lavish spectacle in some rapid cuts, but a shot rarely lasts long enough for you to fully take it in. Even less served by how it's shot and cut are the troupe of talented dancers. Partly this has to do with the frequent refusal to show us their full bodies in motion for any significant period of time, as they too often end up in medium shots as well, and it feels like they don't want the attention to ever be away from Swift for too long. When the dancers do get their due, it is when the number requires a lot of interaction between them and the star, such as the joyous rendition of "22" or when the show's band get to come on the main stage to play with Swift during the "Fearless" era.
It's when the show gets more intimate that the translation becomes much more successful. When she's seated behind a moss-covered piano for "Champagne Problems" or straps on a guitar for the 10-minute version of "All Too Well," there's a focus in the production that Wrench and his editors can seize on and make the most of. A particular high point is "Tolerate It," featuring Swift setting a long dining room table for dinner that she then crawls across in anger, swiping off each glass, dish, and vase in her path playing a woman trying to get through to her inattentive partner (played by dancer Raphael Thomas). Yes, it's spectacle, but it's enormously focused spectacle.
A great concert in a good film
Making a great concert film isn't easy, which is why people cling to "The Last Waltz" or the recently restored and rereleased masterpiece "Stop Making Sense" so tightly. Translating a show that was designed for a stage to an entirely different medium requires a careful attention to shot selection, spacial geography, and juxtaposing the charisma of the performer with their surroundings. As a concert film, "Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour" is decent. Nothing about the filmmaking is downright awful, but nothing about it transcends either. It is content to merely document the concert.
And look, if you are just going to document a concert, "The Eras Tour" is the one to document. For whatever filmmaking pitfalls it has, Taylor Swift has put on a show here that really should be seen, whether you are a die-hard Swiftie or just know the chorus to "Shake It Off." People may make fun of her not so impressive dancing, but what she has is charisma and a genuine joy of performance. For as controlled and choreographed as every single detail of the show is, you can tell she still is finding the fun in what she's giving to the audience. I know I was having fun singing along underneath my mask to "Style," "Cruel Summer," "Anti-Hero," and "The Last Great American Dynasty," and when it comes right down to it, that is the reason why this film exists. "Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour" may not be a great film, but it is a hell of a good time at the movies.
/Film Rating: 7 out of 10