Based on Priscilla Presley’s memoir “Elvis and Me.” Sofia Coppola’s “Priscilla,” dives into Priscilla Presley’s story beginning with the rock n’ roll legend Elvis Presley.  The movie beautifully captures Priscilla Presley’s iconic looks and how she and Elvis Presley met, their marriage and what led to their divorce.

In 2022, Baz Luhrmann released “Elvis,” a film telling the story of how Elvis Presley came to be. This movie does an amazing job of telling the backstory of Elvis Presley with a brief appearance of Priscilla Presley. The star, Elvis Presley, was played by Austin Butler who looks very similar to Elvis Presley and trained rigorously to become exactly like Elvis Presley. 

In “Priscilla,” Elvis Presley was portrayed by “Euphoria” star Jacob Elordi. Elordi’s hair and makeup really helped him fit the image of Elvis Presley. But personally I felt that his voice felt very forced. There was one scene of Elvis Presley playing the piano and singing but it was clear it was not Elordi’s voice. 

“When we watched the film with Priscilla the first time, what struck her the most was how much his voice sounded like Elvis, so that was a big thrill,” Coppola said in an interview with Vanity Fair.

Elordi did make a really emotional performance of Elvis Presley’s drug addiction. He also did an amazing job connecting into character; he moved, sounded and acted just like Elvis Presley. 

Cailee Spaeny was a perfect choice for Priscilla Presley. Spaeny perfectly illustrated Priscilla’s emotions and looks. We got to see an in depth perspective from how much time she spent alone while Elvis was on tour to what she did for Elvis such as taking drugs and changing her identity. The film is very visually appealing with all the colors, the old camera lens film, the 60s props, the costumes and makeup.

Makeup played a really big role with Priscilla’s character. In the beginning of the movie, when Priscilla was a high school student, she wore no makeup to illustrate how young she was. As she got older, her makeup got more and more intense. When Elvis Presley became a national icon, her black hair and her dark eye makeup became her image.

Something that was strange but strangely worked with the main character’s was the height difference. Elordi is really tall and Spaeny is very petite; Coppola explains in an interview about how Spaeny was so small compared to him she had to stand on “apple boxes” while “Priscilla” was being filmed. 

Each scene was perfectly timed out. I feel like I didn’t miss any part of the story; each moment, feeling and reaction was shown. Every detail was there, no matter if it was Priscilla walking around the house bored or her having trouble studying because of Elvis’s extravagant parties. 

Overall I would give this movie a five star rating as it honestly shows the true backstory of Priscilla and Elvis Presley’s life together, beginning to end.

I think that Sofia Coppola’s “Priscilla” was a fairly straightforward in terms of portraying her life in general; however, I think that the movie falls behind both in terms of diving deeper, emotionally, into the depravity of her lifestyle and Sofia Coppola’s previous works such as “Lost in Translation.”

I thought the casting for “Priscilla” was excellent, and while the voice of Elvis seemed fairly forced, the lifestyle portrayed by the two and the uncomfortable beats with knowledge of the age gap between the two was well done. However, when it comes to the pacing and message, the movie falls short.

The movie has a continuous pacing of Elvis returning and leaving due to his Rockstar lifestyle, but at some point it feels as though the message has already been declared and that the repetition is redundant. I do think that this seemingly endless cycle of Elvis leaving demonstrates the amount of trustworthiness Priscilla had to put on Elvis and the stress it put on her, but I feel that it doesn’t make for an entertaining watch when the same thing happens over and over for the entire movie.

I feel like the first time Priscilla took the pill from Elvis was a monumental symbol within her life and the fact that the film never lingered on that was a strangely specific thing that irked me. Along with things that seemed off, the ending was extremely abrupt.

Thinking back on it, I think that the fact that the movie ends with her leaving Elvis shows that she is finally free. It makes the movie seem as though her life was all about Elvis and that she never had her own life, which was quite possibly the entire message of the movie, but I think that it could’ve ended on an uplifting note for Priscilla and how she carried on building up her life.