“In Bed with Madonna,” Alek Keshishian’s documentary that follows Madonna on and off stage during her iconic 1990 Blond Ambition World Tour, alternates flashy concert footage, shot in color, with grittier, personal material in black and white. The symbolism may be heavy-handed, but the film is not.
The documentary begins in Tokyo, with Madonna entertaining a stadium audience in pouring rain. Night after night, the grueling show continues, taking on aspects of a crusade for the team members.
Ironically, every show is preceded by a prayer, everyone holding hands as Madonna asks for God’s help and recites a daily list of problems. And when her dancers have personal problems, they look to her as an advisor and mother figure.
Madonna’s need for shock often causes her problems. Warren Beatty, co-star of “Dick Tracy” (1990) – and Madonna’s lover at the time – berates her for the “insanity” of making her life a public spectacle. There’s a memorable scene where she sticks her fingers down her throat after Kevin Costner calls her show ‘cool’.
But there is also a lot of talk about his soft side. She is the confessing mother to her seven dancers, mostly gay men who are new to the celebrity road, organizing family gatherings and soothing fragile egos.
She also becomes confused, scared and stressed. Alone in her hotel room, juggling phones in a bathrobe and no makeup, Madonna looks exhausted. But she’s not complaining. This is her fantasy, and she is living it to the fullest.
This is a cautionary x-ray, because the film doesn’t always show her at her best. We see her pacing around in a bad mood, shouting orders and denouncing her team.
Even when pressured by the Toronto police, who see Like a Virgin’s performance as obscene, she sees it as “artistic expression” and will not change anything about her show, even if she could be arrested. She prepared her body, honed her vocal chords and brought precision to her dancing. And she is proud of her work.
This is a cautionary x-ray, because the film doesn’t always show her at her best. We see her pacing around in a bad mood, shouting orders and calling out her team for their failures and incompetence; we see her slamming the phone in Warren Beatty’s face and throwing a tantrum in the bathroom.
When Pedro Almodóvar, whose films she says she loves, offers her a gala dinner in Madrid, Madonna is excited to meet Antonio Banderas, but is greatly disappointed when she discovers that the actor is married. “In the end, he’s not even that good of an actor,” she says.
The organizing theme of the entire film is work. We learn a lot about how hard Madonna works, about her methods with her dancers and her backstage support team, and about how brutally difficult it is to go on a world tour.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtYp9YKhUZ8
In the film, the queen steps down from her throne to laugh at his narcissism. “In Bed with Madonna” shows moments of vulnerability. Her heart is not in sex, but in business, and the film’s central value is work ethic.
*Eduardo de Assumpção is a journalist and responsible for the blog cinematografiaqueer.blogspot.com
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By Ezatamentchy
Source: Maxima
I am an experienced author and journalist with a passion for lifestyle journalism. I currently work for Buna Times, one of the leading news websites in the world. I specialize in writing stories about health, wellness, fashion, beauty, interior design, and more. My articles have been featured on major publications such as The Guardian and The Huffington Post.