We live in an age of ballyhoo, build-up, publicity, call it what you will. It's a time when people can be famous for the best and worst reasons, and it is all the same: get yourself known, hit the talk shows, become an influencer on YouTube, cash in and cash out. It's not a new phenomenon. It seems that most people don't care about right or wrong. Therefore, looking at this admiring, fawning half-hour movie about the wedding of Grace Kelly to Prince Ranier looks like simply another example of the random way that the world rewards people.
That freak-show attitude has a good deal to recommend itself to someone trying to understand this movie. It's too polite for modern taste. There are no sex tapes (unless you count Miss Kelly's performance in MOGAMBO), no drunken brother banned from the ceremony because he's a jerk, no estranged father whining to the media about how much he loves his little girl.
It is the absence of these elements that tells us we are dealing with a different society. It's a world that hungers for beauty and a happy ending. We may look at it and sneer, but are we wiser for being cynical?
That freak-show attitude has a good deal to recommend itself to someone trying to understand this movie. It's too polite for modern taste. There are no sex tapes (unless you count Miss Kelly's performance in MOGAMBO), no drunken brother banned from the ceremony because he's a jerk, no estranged father whining to the media about how much he loves his little girl.
It is the absence of these elements that tells us we are dealing with a different society. It's a world that hungers for beauty and a happy ending. We may look at it and sneer, but are we wiser for being cynical?