It could be just me, but it seems like Fall is the time of year when historical dramas dominate the theater.  They do make for intriguing Oscar bait.  Fantasy can be fun but real life is what often gets critics interested.  Roughly speaking, in the last twenty-five years, over half of the films that have won the Academy Award for Best Picture have been either based real events, or have a grounding in reality.  With that last phrase, what I mean is something that is set in the backdrop of actual events.  One of these stories that has received a great deal of recent attention is that of Elvis Presley.  Though it did not premier in the same season, it was a little over a year ago that we got Elvis (2022).  Now we have today’s film, Priscilla.  Obviously, there is no denying that the King of Rock n’ Roll still enjoys a large amount of popularity, despite being dead for the better part of fifty years.  At the same time, I find it hard to comprehend that such is his level of recognizability to this day that it warrants two major motion pictures in a little more than the turn of the calendar.  I enjoy this stuff, but will a general audience?  Read on and decide for yourself.

The one thing to know right away about Priscilla Beaulieu (her maiden name) is that when she meets Elvis Preseley (Jacob Elordi), she is only fourteen-years-old.  Yes, things are different in 1959 when their romance starts, but not so divergent that her concerned parents would ignore this age difference.  Their encounter is not by chance, either.  The Beaulieus are stationed in West Germany (at this time, Germany was divided between East and West) with the United States Army, as is Elvis.  Another officer who serves with the already globally popular rock star sees Priscilla at an on-base diner and invites the young lady Elvis’ house for a party.  In order for her to come, she needs the permission of her parents as obtained by the person who gave the invitation, ensuring her constant chaperoning and supervision.  It is not long into that evening’s soiree that Elvis notices Priscilla.  He is drawn to her for . . . reasons.  He says it is because he misses having someone from home to talk to, but as their relationship progresses it seems like he wants a “kept woman.”  With her young age and his notoriety, she is smitten almost immediately.  To his credit (or as much credit as can be given to somebody who is dating a teenager when he is in his mid-twenties), he asks permission to take her out.  Then, a few months later, his service ends and he returns to the United States.  She is left to continue on with her life.  They maintain sporadic contact, which only feeds her longings.  She also does not enjoy reading about his affairs in the press.  Thus, it is with some surprise that two years later he asks that she come visit him in the United States.  Again, he does the gentlemanly thing by approaching her parents before purchasing her plane tickets.  Her trip only increases her attachment to him, and soon she is allowed to stay in Graceland, Elvis’ famous Tennessee estate outside of Memphis, with the provision that she finishes her schooling.  That is right, she is still in high school.  As she ingratiates herself to his family and friends, there is the sense that she is being molded by him.  He tells her to die her hair and to wear certain colors, all things she does in order to impress him.  Throughout all this, though, they do not have sex, something the movie takes pains to show you.  It is also painful for her because it is something she clearly desires, but she continues to acquiesce to his desires and plans.  She also puts up with his odd mood swings, which is the result of his growing drug addiction, though this film does not emphasize it as much as other cinematic examples.  There are other illicit substances used, such as when they experiment with lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD).  Otherwise, they spend a lot of time laying in bed taking pictures of each other or watching television, which is . . . something.  It comes off as vaguely romantic, but there are a lot of scenes of just this sort of thing, so be prepared.  Now, you may have noticed so far that they have yet to get married. Indeed, this does not come until his manager puts pressure on him to do so, and it is after she has lived with him for some years.  Their wedding day does bring the long-awaited coitus, and a baby following shortly thereafter.  It also coincides with a rebirth of Elvis’ career that sees him constantly either playing in Las Vegas or touring.  What this means is that he is consistently away from Priscilla, and she begins to have a life of her own.  It also does not help that he is being unfaithful to her.  One evening when she is in Las Vegas visiting him, she is called from her dinner to come up to his penthouse.  Once there, he tries to force himself onto her, saying crass and vulgar lines in the process, but she fights him off.  The next morning, he awakens to her sitting next to his bed and saying that she wants a divorce.  He appears somewhat conflicted, but it represents a bold, though difficult, step for her.  The final scene shows her making her goodbyes to the gilded cage that was Graceland and driving away on her own.

Since I talked about history in the introduction, it bears mentioning that Priscilla is based on the book by the eponymous character titled Elvis and Me: The True Story of the Love Between Priscilla Presley and the King of Rock ‘n Roll (1985).  I have not read it, but from what I have been able to gather from the internet, it looks like Priscilla follows it fairly closely.  I could be wrong, but this is my impression.  The thing I had trouble with in the film was in understanding Elvis’ motivations for doing anything.  I suppose this is not entirely necessary since the movie is about Priscilla and not Elvis.  And from this point of view, it does a serviceable job of showing the transformation she undergoes from a starry-eyed teenager to becoming an independent woman.  This is what she cites for why they needed to separate, because they already had individual lives.  This comes gradually, too.  Early on, in one of his fits, he angrily packs her bags and demands she returns to her parents.  She is devastated, and her sobbing convinces him to change his mind.  Later, when again she is complaining about his extra-marital affairs, he tells her that they need to have a temporary separation, she calmly tells him to simply inform her when and it would be done.  What I am missing is why somebody like Elvis, who has everything he could want, including the seemingly perfect girl (relatively speaking, of course), would behave as he did.  I get that a movie can only do so much, but his actions mainly come off as being whims.  There is more to the story, and I wish just a little more of it could have been told.

The story we do have in Priscilla is about the title character’s development, and this Catholic was excited to learn that she is raised Catholic.  My excitement was short lived, however.  Outside of the brief mention of her Faith, and the fact that she completed her schooling at a Catholic school run by nuns, little of the film delves into this aspect.  Perhaps more disturbingly, if you do a little more research on Priscilla, you will learn that she wanted to use birth control, and even considered having her daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, aborted.  This is not shown in the movie, but it does speak to her hesitation about wanting to be pregnant so soon after her wedding.  This is because she is afraid for what it could mean for her relationship with Elvis.  This is where the theme mentioned previously can underscore a point about Catholic marriages that goes against stereotypes.  While what we see between Elvis and Priscilla is fraught with a great deal of sinful and unhealthy interactions, particularly before their wedding day, she becomes increasingly insistent that she has needs.  This is something God instills in men and women from the moment of their conception.  Because this is Hollywood, the automatic assumption is that it must be fulfilled in a sexual fashion.  This does not have to be the case, but we will give Priscilla a pass here since she is not preparing to become a nun.  In the meantime, she has to live like a nun, and the movie portrays this as a source of frustration.  Had they been married, Elvis purposely withholding intercourse as he does would not be considered a good thing from a Catholic perspective.  The bedroom act is a sacramental one between a husband and wife.  To deny it is unnatural.

As such, in one sense I can understand Priscilla.  She got naïvely swept into a world she did not expect, and learned that it is okay to have her God-given desires.  As I said, the flaw in the film is being left largely clueless as to the motivations of the other half of this relationship.  It is also a bit repetitive in the way the story unfolds.  Thus, it works, and it does not work, if that makes any sense.