Sofia Coppola’s adaptation of Priscilla Presley’s biography, Elvis and Me, published in 1985, is a subtle and intimate work about the emancipation of a woman under the yoke of a pygmalion since adolescence.
The story of a bride dazzled by the aura of her Sun King, then condemned to the shadows by the King, who locks her in his Graceland castle. A story in perfect harmony with the rest of Sofia Coppola’s filmography, about young women in search of freedom, which rises through its mastery above the fray of Bling Ring, Beguiled and On the Rocks, even Marie Antoinette.
Priscilla Beaulieu was only 14 years old – the age of Marie Antoinette when she was married to the future Louis XVI – and Elvis Presley was 10 years older when they met in Germany in 1959. Elvis was serving military in Bavaria. Priscilla lives there with her parents on an American base. It’s love at first sight. He cures his homesickness with this teenager from Austin, Texas. She is in heaven and spends her days fantasizing about the idol of American youth.
It is from this moment, and through the eyes of Priscilla Presley, that Sofia Coppola tells this mythical love story that today we would describe as toxic.
That said, the film’s soundtrack is filled with anachronistic gems – a trademark of Sofia Coppola’s cinema – from Joan Jett’s rendition of Crimson and Clover to Dolly Parton’s original version of I Will Always Love You, perfectly marrying the end of the film and of this marriage, which lasted from 1967 to 1973. The soundtrack, signed by Phoenix, the French group of Sofia Coppola’s husband, Thomas Mars, is fabulously vaporous, as is the artistic direction. .
At age 16, Priscilla Beaulieu moved to Graceland and finished high school at a Catholic school in Memphis. The fantasy of kitschy castle life in Graceland quickly takes a turn for the gilded prison. Priscilla is the story of thwarted love and an addiction to amphetamines and sleeping pills that Elvis encouraged her to take.
He is her confidant and her husband, not enough her lover and very much her father. He decides everything, from when they can make love (on their wedding night, according to the story), to the color of her hair (black) and dresses (blue). He doesn’t ask her to marry him, he announces their marriage to her.
Each time Priscilla reproaches her husband for his numerous infidelities (with Nancy Sinatra or Ann-Margret, for example), he lets the threat of his replacement by a more docile and indulgent wife hang like a sword of Damocles. Even pregnant with Lisa Marie (who died last January), Priscilla endures Elvis’ mood swings, who suggest a break in their marriage.
Sofia Coppola made the wise choice to entrust these iconic roles to little-known actors. Australian Jacob Elordi (Euphoria) does not try to imitate Elvis, as Austin Butler did in the film of the same name. He is much taller than Elvis, so much so that Priscilla looks like a child next to him (which is probably intentional). On the other hand, it gives off an energy that is both touching and terrifying.
The American Cailee Spaeny, who won the Best Actress Award at the most recent Venice Film Festival, is completely convincing, both in the skin of a lovestruck teenager and in that of an emancipated woman of 28 years.
The dynamic between the two actors certainly helps make Priscilla the best film from The Virgins Suicides filmmaker since Lost in Translation, 20 years ago.
