Chelsea Lupkin
Now, more than ever, the need for validation on social media permeates our society. Its connection to self-worth and the quest for fleeting gratification can wreak havoc on young people. Unspoken peer pressure to be watched and ‘liked’ in the digital space is at the heart of Jannis Lenz’s film WANNABE, which chronicles a young teen named Coco and her pursuit of stardom on YouTube. A desire for celebrity is not a new phenomenon in society, but the digital era is distinct from what has come before in both the democratization of the ways it is achieved and, correspondingly, the potential for self-delusion. Lenz and his co-writers, Andi Widmer and Matthias Writze, utilize a star-making performance from their lead actress to explore the dangers of building a fictitious self and, fascinatingly, go beyond the confines of the short film medium to do so.
German actress Anna Suk gives a disarmingly authentic performance as Coco, a struggling teen actress whose view of fame is both pitiful and relatable. As Coco loses hope, skips out on school, and disappoints her mother, Suk impressively puts us in her headspace. Her single-minded pursuit of a winning formula for popularity places her into awkward scenarios that threaten her future prospects, her relationship with her best friend, and her relationship to herself, which is still in its awkward early stages of formation. Yet, her naivete and inherent charisma are ultimately affecting—while it’s easy to cringe and dislike what her character is after, we can’t help but feel sorry for Coco and hope for her success.
A long film at nearly 30min, while the themes of WANNABE are not revelatory, the depth and veracity of the portrait Lenz has constructed is. There are many films we’ve screened that deal wholly or tangentially with new media fame, but this is the most empathetic and wholly realized treatment we’ve yet encountered in a short film. Some of this can be chalked up to the production approach—when filming WANNABE, Lenz wanted to make sure Coco felt as genuinely real as possible, so scenes become mere sketches in order to provide context for his actors and a suitable framework for improvisation, allowing the actors to inject their own personalities into their roles. Casting is drawn from the communities the film images—the models of the opening scene were from Austria’s Next Top Model, and real-life casting directors and other entertainment figures cameo throughout.
Coco’s YouTube posts are a critical component of the narrative, and are, of course, disingenuously positive and glamourous, providing stark contrast to her life off-camera. Lenz’s commentary about the difference between what we project online and our real lives illustrates a cynical outlook on social media fame and how achieving a fantasy doesn’t come without the same life problems—particularly feelings of inadequacy. A lengthy scene near the end of the film sees Coco looking in the mirror and harshly judging her body. It seems cliché, but its resonance at this point of the film is not, as we’ve formed an unusually intense bond with the character by this point.
We’ve mentioned authenticity several times in this review, and the production team has gone to interesting lengths to extend that via transmedia complements to the film. Lenz created YouTube playlists that document a larger picture of the COCO-CHANNEL world (even going as far as posting the music video Coco appears in on an adjacent channel). Not only can viewers see her vlogs, they can interact with commenters in a real-life, albeit digital way. While the audience sees Coco catfish her viewers in the short—or at least try to—Lenz attempts to catfish the internet by posting her journey online the way that her character does in the film. On YouTube, she’s a real thing, just not quite famous like she hopes to become in the short.
The care put into both the film and its richly realized, multi-platform world-building is a credit to its creative team, and its experienced producers, Lukas Zweng and Roland Fischer. It is an effort that has been deservedly honored—a winner at the cathedral of short film, Clermont Ferrand, WANNABE was also one of the nominees for the European Film Awards, the continent’s equivalent to The Oscars. A wonderfully relevant film that speaks to the online world we currently live in, WANNABE is a mesmerizing piece of fiction that many young people will eerily relate to.