Twiggy (REVIEW) | Projector Shorts | The enduring 60s icon - video Dailymotion

Film Brain

Film Brain reviews this star-studded documentary about the hugely influential 60s model, actor, and singer, that's a love letter, but maybe could delve deeper in her legendary career's impact.

Transcript

00:00Sadie Frost looks at the life and career of the 60s icon Twiggy in this documentary.

00:05The film follows her as she becomes an overnight success that took the modelling world by storm when she was only 16

00:10before she later moved into acting, singing and fashion designing

00:14but sometimes struggled with managing fame with her private life.

00:18I think it helps that I knew very little about Twiggy going into it.

00:21Obviously I was familiar with her being one of the most famous models ever

00:24but this film did tell me a lot that I didn't know including, surprisingly, her film career.

00:29But what's interesting about Twiggy is that she very much became a symbol of the youthquake going on in 60s Britain.

00:34As Joanna Lumley attests, the modelling world was very much for the upper class

00:38and here was this working class cockney who became the biggest thing in the industry in only a matter of weeks.

00:44But Twiggy had more talent than her looks as she would make her film debut directed by Ken Russell,

00:49she'd launch a successful scene career, perform on Broadway and defy expectations of simply being a passing trend.

00:56What you get from the documentary is that Twiggy managed to constantly reinvent herself with each passing era

01:01but through it all, she managed to remain resolutely herself and keep her appeal.

01:06The challenge for a life filled with accomplishments is it's very hard to focus on everything

01:11and The Dog touches on a lot of topics that I could have easily seen expanded.

01:14I think it's most engaging when it talks about her early fame which was so overwhelming that it was scary

01:20like when she had to be carried to safety as fans in America swarmed her.

01:24There's also the constant string of male interviewers asking a teenager demeaning questions about her size and appearance

01:30like when Woody Allen intends to humiliate her and she manages to get her own back.

01:35The film brings in Brooke Shields and Sienna Miller as talking heads

01:38who know a thing or two about fame at a young age and press intrusion

01:42but they don't get a lot of screen time to add more of their own insight into what it's like to go through that.

01:48The film does offer some glimpses into the private Twiggy, especially her relationships

01:52such as her first boyfriend and manager Justin Dievoldnerv who does not participate in this documentary

01:57or her first husband Michael Whitney struggles with alcoholism

02:01and there's a particularly bizarre and terrifying encounter with the notorious Phil Spector.

02:06But as Twiggy starts to work more sporadically in her later years, the documentary loses structure near the end

02:11and becomes a bitty collection of she did this, she did that.

02:15Mostly though this is clearly a love letter, literally so when Twiggy's daughter talks straight to the camera

02:21about how much she loves her and filled with lots of celebrity friends

02:24such as Dustin Hoffman, Paul and Stella McCartney, Fran Drescher and more.

02:28It makes for an uplifting doc but don't expect a deep look at Twiggy's impact on the modelling world.

02:33This is mostly just a nice wander down the catwalk of memory lane.

Twiggy (REVIEW) | Projector Shorts | The enduring 60s icon

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