GWAS Film School: Sofia Coppola's Somewhere

GWAS Film School: Somewhere

By Lucy Brook

Four years on from Marie Antoinette, a lavish, pastry studded romp through Versailles, where Kirsten Dunst ran through the halls in sync with New Order and The Strokes, Sofia Coppola returns with Somewhere, a pensive study of an actor and his (seemingly) enviable Los Angeles existence.

Johnny Marco, played by Stephen Dorff, has a permanent dwelling at the Chateau Marmont, Sunset Boulevard’s arcane celebrity retreat, where he kills time watching strippers swing on portable poles and smoking on the hotel’s sun-drenched balcony. 


His eleven-year-old daughter Cleo (the enigmatic Elle Fanning), breathes life into his Hollywood cocoon with regular visits, and Coppola distills the essence of their tender father/daughter relationship by juxtaposing its tender authenticity with vacuous parties, banal press conferences (“who is Johnny Marco?”) and fast cars.

Coppola – who won the Academy Award for best screenplay in 2004 for the brilliant Lost in Translation, and recently took home the coveted Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival for Somewhere – takes us deep within the exotic worlds of celebrity and fame, but Somewhere is more melancholy than her previous offerings, taking the examination of loneliness, isolation, connection and innocence even further.

"I wanted to show the contrast between Johnny Marco's superficial and genuine worlds, that a life of just room service girls and Ferraris aren't fulfilling on their own (though it sounds good)," Coppola, muse to the famously fast-living Marc Jacobs, told art, fashion and culture site NOWNESS (owned by luxury group LVMH).

It’s a film that rattles around in your head for days, with the sadness and the imagery slowly seeping in. Fingers crossed Coppola is in line for another guest editorship at French Vogue (her first was in 2005) in the near future.

Somewhere is in cinemas Boxing Day. Watch the trailer here.

Yours truly,
Lucy @ Girl With a Satchel