A movie about a pen name of an author I've never heard of?
I've never heard of JT LeRoy so I looked it up. Turns out it was a pen name for Laura Albert...who I've never heard of. She wrote some books that I've also never heard of.
Hmmmmm. I don't see this as being a blockbuster. But who knows?
Sonny: Is there a country you'd like to go to?
Sal: Wyoming.
So you've never heard of her or the books so it's unimportant?
I read the books far before it was revealed it was a pen name.
Cool!
Sonny: Is there a country you'd like to go to?
Sal: Wyoming.
A lot of people were pissed off when it was revealed that JT LeRoy was a pseudonym because the books are supposed to be autobiographical and deal with sexual abuse and prostitution. Creating a pseudonym and then creating a backstory for the author that they were abused seems a bit morally repugnant.
shareCreating a pseudonym and then creating a backstory for the author that they were abused seems a bit morally repugnant.
I feel the same as the OP. If I have to go look up who this movie is about, only to find out that it's not about anyone, just an imaginary person, and see and hear all the gory details about his/her childhood sexual abuse, I'll pass. I'd rather spend two hours plucking my nose hairs.
share"A movie about a pen name of an author I've never heard of?"
Well, who are you? Why do you need to have heard of JT or Laura before this in order to be interested? Do you blow off every new movie/artist/musician before you even see/hear the work? And then you come here to boast of how you are way-too-cool you to even consider this? Lame. Enjoy that vanilla ice cream, man.
The stories are not for the squeamish. But they are excellent. They stand on their own, regardless of who wrote them.
Did you watch this doc? It explains how it started out (phone calls to suicide hot lines) and how the whole JT thing began. I don't think it was done intentionally, ie to get rich, or whatever everyone was angry about. Laura seems like a needy attention whore who did things to gain attention and it snowballed, and the ruse got deeper and deeper. And this movie? She was enjoying every minute of it, the retelling. The outfit, the makeup, all of it just screams "lookit me! lookit me!" She also didn't seem to care much how anyone feels about her or the whole thing.
Still, I'm willing to believe mental illness plays a part here. It's sad, in its way. She's a desperately unhappy person. Lots of people lie about their pasts...and this was certainly not the first time a pen name was used. She just pist off a bunch of celebrities (speaking of attention whores) because they ended up looking stupid by a "less than" who duped them. The opening scene with Winona Ryder? Brilliant. Everyone JT used used him too.