If you’ve never seen audience members stand at a movie, get ready for “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour.”
During the filmed version of her recent concert tour, young fans rise, sing, cheer and applaud the dozens of elaborate production numbers. The experience is close to being at the real thing.
Filmed at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, over several nights, the show includes 40-some songs from 10 albums. Because the stage is so huge (it’s like an airport runway), dancers fill in the spaces Swift doesn’t occupy.
Frequently, she struts down the stage like a model while those dancers set the mood for dark love songs, upbeat empowerment numbers and what looks like the talent portion of the Miss America Pageant.
Swift wears dozens of costumes, too. Many begin with a figure skater’s outfit then morph into ballgowns and MET Gala get-ups. Visually, it’s a sight worth seeing. A huge video screen creates all sorts of backgrounds which evoke those albums she’s sampling.
“Evermore” even prompts the arrival of a mossy house that finds her in an upstairs attic while the crowd settles down.
Much, though, is designed to get the faithful jumping and cheering. They don’t disappoint.
Swift’s many goodbye songs are just part of her identity as an underdog (even though she’s one of the richest performers in music). She goes back to the early ones in an acoustic set; goes full Carrie Underwood on one of those “get revenge” songs and, oddly, even uses the ultimate four-letter word in two songs.
While Swift’s vocal range isn’t on par with Beyonce’s or Adele’s it does reflect her confidence. To sell the songs, she engages in a series of poses that are interesting to watch. This show has been choreographed down to the last turn.
When it is a bit spontaneous, the real Taylor emerges. She’s a sweet woman at the piano and an accomplished lyricist when she explains her inspirations. She also seems genuinely grateful for the adulation. At one point, she gives a girl from the audience her hat and, consistently, waves and winks at folks in the far reaches of the stadium.
While director Sam Wrench tries to capture much of the excitement, he’s limited in the amount of room he has to work with. He doesn’t surround Swift with cameras or show her getting ready backstage. (How she changes costumes so quickly would be a viral video.) He plays it all very straightforward and lets her personality do the heavy lifting.
Colors help convey the different albums’ moods and, for the most part, Swift fits the scheme. She moves like Liza Minnelli in one segment, Stevie Nicks in another. There’s a Pink Ladies-like approach, too, and a big snake (for “Milestones”) that looks like it might foreshadow yet another character change. That 10-minute “Taylor’s Version” of “All Too Well” gets plenty of play and hints at it being her “American Pie.” It’s not, of course, but it helps reference the different phases fans have seen.
While those early country years get a nod, it’d be very easy to forget she was once the biggest act in the genre.
“The Eras Tour” is her “This is It,” her Central Park concert, her “Blonde Ambition” Tour. It represents a very successful career and, in the process, looks like a ball for everyone on and off the stage.
