By Glenn Dunks
British X-Ray Spex frontwoman Poly Styrene and American pop superstar Janet Jackson are two very different musicians. It stands to reason that any biographic documentary about either would be wildly unalike. Although both artists are boundary-pushing women of colour in music, on very basic metrics, Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché and Janet Jackson. are indeed very different. One is a exploration of a punk icon’s chaotic life and early death in all of its subject’s messy, unglamorous glory. The other is a sprawling, four-part work of popumentary that venerates and celebrates with high-gloss entertainment. However, it is in the areas where these projects intersect where one project finds its strengths and the other, unfortunately, falters...
I Am a Cliché is co-written, co-directed and co-produced by Celeste Bell, Poly Styrene’s daughter. Janet Jackson. is executive produced by Jackson herself. In the former, that intimate connection allows the documentary to reach places of profound personal reflection and tender confessional. For the latter, having the subject so close to the production gives it an airless quality as if watching somebody recite Jackson’s Wikipedia entry (with intervals to switch tabs to YouTube for a video or a performance). It’s an interesting dichotomy. Why does one work and the other doesn’t?
Unlike a lot of musician bio-docs, Poly Styrene intertwines the standard career and personal highlights/lowlights with something of a first-person therapy session for Styrene’s daughter. Poly Styrene aka Marianne Elliott-Said and Bell did not have an easy relationship—something that gives the film a sad and tumultuous friction. Styene, with her Somali heritage, existed in a racist society and toxic music industry as an unexpected icon, sporting braces and an unconventional clash of fashions made of vinyl, wool, metal and military iconography. With her drag queen stage name (it’s actually a satirical twist on plastic pop stardom) and the band X-Ray Spex, her breakthrough was a feminist anthem titled “Oh Bondage Up Yours!” in their brief period as stars who even made it onto Top of the Pops. Mental health issues, unsuccessful solo material and a diversion to the Hare Krishnas cut her career short; cancer ultimately took her at the age of 53.
Jackson, 55, on the other hand has had her own share of chaos. Although in stark contrast to I Am A Cliché, director Ben Hirsch doesn’t so much embed us into it through editing and narrative construction as he does let us glide ever so above it. Growing up in front of America as a member of a prodigious celebrity family, she took the reins of her career as a teenager and upon the release of her third album, Control at just age 20, she (along with unmentioneds like Madonna and Whitney Houston) shifted the image of pop music and used her platform to highlight social struggles.
The problem with a work such as this is that while most of us know Janet Jackson, Hirsch nor Jackson (or brother Randy, another executive producer) doesn’t want to let us in too deep. While it is understandable that much of the dirty laundry audiences may hope for has been thoroughly cleaned, starched, ironed and packed away neatly to be referenced as a necessity, other areas remain frustratingly unexplored. Much is referenced, for instance, about her legendary Rhythm Nation 1814 album and its political messages around race and drugs, yet little is truly put under any sort of forensic microscope. You’d get more out of the Grammy-winning video concept album or read Ayanna Dozier’s comprehensive 33 ⅓ book of The Velvet Rope.
The project more or less ignores pricklier works like that 1997 album. With its strong themes of domestic abuse and queer liberation, that’s a decision that appears incongruous with the greater Jackson narrative as determined survivor and social warrior that is being presented. Its exclusion highlights just how surface level it is actively trying to be rather than being so by accident.
Granted, the punk streets of Britain probably lend themselves to a less varnished portrayal of musicianship than the overly controlled machinations of American pop stardom. “This is my story, told by me”, is how the series was advertised, so it’s not like there was any bait and switch. But what Jackson and Hirsch have ultimately chosen to tell is often stifling to real dramatic momentum. Beyond a film-capping end credits appearance by Samuel L. Jackson about “Throb” (my favourite Jackson song), Jackson’s sexual side is entirely absent. Beyond her time in white-only neighbourhoods as a child, so too is her blackness (although, if I remember correctly, there are no white interviewees, which is strong, personal choice). Meanwhile, Poly Styrene’s deeply personal writings are recited by in her film by Ruth Negga, allowing us authentic access to her deepest thoughts in times of struggle.
Jackson is ultimately at its best then when allowing viewers to luxuriate in Jackson’s talents. On occasion series editor John Smith allows a Jackson performance to play out in full. This is something Poly Styrene does not, often cutting down performances or interjecting with a talking head or newsflash. But then at least I Am a Cliché doesn’t have a dribbly, overly directional musical score over many of its narrative beats.
I have no doubt that many will be entertained by Janet Jackson. I was, it’s true. It’s hard not to be when her back catalogue of bangers so routinely filter through the sheen (or even the occasional technical snafu). But while it’s better than the dual travesties that befell Whitney Houston after her death (Neil Broomfield’s Whitney: Can I Be Me in 2017 and Kevin Macdonald’s Whitney in 2018), it’s not great filmmaking. Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché is the scrappier of the two, with verve and attitude it ultimately reaches a more satisfying emotional climax.
Release: Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché has a one night only release in theatres and will be on demand from February 4. Janet Jackson. is streaming on a variety of international platforms including Lifetime/A&E in America, Stan in Australia and Sky TV in the UK.
Awards chances: Poly Styrene has already proven a winner at the British Independent Film Awards, but broader attention in the US will prove trickier given its early release and less well-known subject. Janet Jackson. will no doubt feature in the Emmy techs later in 2022.