Tribeca - P-Star Rising
Documentary about child hip-hop phenom Priscilla Star and her father’s attempts to turn her into a star. It is a good documentary. The director got incredible access, spending over four years following the family and filming them in pretty much every situation, the good and the bad. While part of it focuses on the musical side of the family, a lot of it centers around the difficulties faced by a single father trying to raise two young girls. Obviously, though, it is the musical side where the film really comes to life, as you watch P-Star move from a nine year old performing at Harlem hip-hop clubs, to a child Latin music star, and then finally into a star on the PBS show The Electric Company. Her attitude and presence, the same things that made her a star on the stage, drive the film forward. This isn’t a bad time for the documentary to be coming out. P-Star is gearing up to release her latest record and the film is probably doing some nice front line publicity work. But it will hopefully also serve as something of a cautionary tale. As the film careens between the highs (the platinum latin album) and the lows (the record label folds and her father has to go back to work as a caterer to pay bills, since he didn’t manage to save any money) the overriding message seems to be, just cause things are going right, doesn’t mean they’re always going to. Don’t worry about the past, but make sure you can take care of the future. Four out of five for film, but P-Star gets a five out of five. She dropped a nice 16 on the audience after the film—stylewise sounded a bit like Macromantic—good stuff. Hopefully her new album is all that.