{"id":542778,"date":"2026-01-25T22:57:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-25T22:57:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/542778\/"},"modified":"2026-01-25T22:57:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-25T22:57:12","slug":"inside-the-moment-charli-xcx-explores-brat-summer-and-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/542778\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside ‘The Moment’: Charli xcx explores Brat summer and success"},"content":{"rendered":"

PARK CITY, Utah (AP) \u2014 Charli xcx<\/a> plays herself in \u201cThe Moment,\u201d<\/a> a meta mockumentary about the end of Brat summer<\/a> and grappling with otherworldly success.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just really interested in telling this story about expectation,\u201d Charli xcx told The Associated Press the day after \u201cThe Moment\u201d debuted at the Sundance Film Festival.<\/a><\/p>\n

The 33-year-old pop star from Essex has been in the music industry since she was 16, with a career trajectory that she described as anything but straight forward. Then, in 2024, it hit a crescendo with her sixth studio album, \u201cBrat,\u201d<\/a> which became a pop culture phenomenon. Finally, she said, she felt understood for a moment. And then, just as quickly, it changed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was this sort of, kind of, you know, persona that people really associated me with and then there were a lot of expectations put on me as a person, as an artist, of who I was then supposed to be. And I didn\u2019t fit into that sort of narrative,\u201d she said. \u201cI had got to this place where I was finally feeling so understood. Then I was like not understood again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Making something immensely popular and resonant can be a double-edged sword for an artist working in a business that would sometimes rather milk the \u201csure thing\u201d forever than let someone evolve and move on. She found herself wanting to grapple with that tension, that existential conundrum that she\u2019d experienced.<\/p>\n

Charli xcx likes a \u201cmeta moment\u201d<\/p>\n

A straightforward documentary didn\u2019t seem like right approach, so she and Aidan Zamiri, the 30-year-old Scottish photographer and music video director, got to work on something else, something that felt truer to them. \u201cThe Moment\u201d is a little \u201cThis is Spinal Tap,\u201d a little \u201cBlack Swan,\u201d a little meta, with the likes of Kylie Jenner<\/a> and Rachel Sennott playing themselves, a little funny and a little wild. It\u2019s heightened, but also true.<\/p>\n

\u201cI won\u2019t lie, there are definitely some crossovers,\u201d she said. \u201cI haven\u2019t made the choices that Charli in the film makes, but I\u2019ve definitely, like, come close to it. \u2026 It was a very accurate depiction of what I\u2019ve experienced in the music industry.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the buzziest titles in a starry program, the A24 film will be in theaters faster than most: It opens in New York and Los Angeles on Jan. 30 and expands wide on Feb. 6.<\/p>\n

Charli xcx officially brought \u201cBrat summer\u201d to the snowy peaks of the Sundance Film Festival on Friday with the premiere of her highly anticipated mockumentary, \u201cThe Moment.\u201d (Jan. 24)<\/p>\n

In \u201cThe Moment,\u201d Charli xcx is under pressure as Brat summer comes to an end, having to stage a concert film with Amazon, with a sleazy director not of her choosing played by Alexander Skarsg\u00e5rd, promote a Brat credit card, and fall in line with what music executives want from her. She\u2019s also not sleeping and getting increasingly frazzled about everything.<\/p>\n

Zamiri, who directed her \u201c360\u201d music video and has become one of her best friends, was excited by the challenge and to direct his first feature film. He also understood intrinsically what she was going through.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s this battle of expectations and of people wanting one thing from you and you feeling this pressure too, to stick with it, to keep providing that one thing for fear that maybe that attention, that excitement about you will falter if the next thing they don\u2019t love,\u201d Zamiri said. \u201cI love the process of making stuff. But part of it, which is often really exciting but also weird, is the sharing with the world because then it\u2019s just no longer yours anymore \u2026 it becomes its own thing which I think we saw happen in real-time with Brat.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Director<\/p>\n

Director Aidan Zamiri, left, and Charli xcx attend the premiere of \u201cThe Moment.\u201d (AP Photo\/Chris Pizzello)<\/p>\n

Director Aidan Zamiri, left, and Charli xcx attend the premiere of \u201cThe Moment.\u201d (AP Photo\/Chris Pizzello)<\/p>\n

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Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.<\/p>\n

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Getting the film to the fans<\/p>\n

As with the \u201cBrat\u201d album and everything she does, Charli xcx has been intimately involved in the marketing and promotion of the movie too.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love marketing, I really do,\u201d she said. \u201cI think there\u2019s an interesting gap in film between the vision of the filmmaker and the marketing. It\u2019s been really cool working with A24, who are definitely determined to bridge that gap. I mean like, come on, with \u2018Marty Supreme,<\/a> \u2019 for instance? It was so well done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her favorite part, though, is always the creative process, so to have made a film about just that was especially rewarding, she said, \u201ceven when I\u2019m being an absolute crazy (expletive).\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"This<\/p>\n

Charli xcx in a scene from \u201cThe Moment.\u201d (A24 via AP)<\/p>\n

Charli xcx in a scene from \u201cThe Moment.\u201d (A24 via AP)<\/p>\n

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There\u2019s a palpable energy around \u201cThe Moment\u201d as it approaches its theatrical release. Charli xcx made sure that some fans actually got into the premiere, not just industry folks and those who could afford expensive festival passes. Afterward many celebrated into the wee hours of the morning at a DJ\u2019d party.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love all the fans wanting to roll up with their sunglasses on and their crop tops,\u201d Zamiri said. \u201cI get the feeling they\u2019ll show up for this like they would for a concert. That\u2019s the coolest thing ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

An unofficial coronation for Charli xcx, the actor<\/p>\n

The Sundance Film Festival was a kind of coronation for Charli xcx, the actor, with three films across the first weekend, including Gregg Araki\u2019s \u201cI Want Your Sex,\u201d where she played the uptight girlfriend of Cooper Hoffman\u2019s character, and Cathy Yan\u2019s \u201cThe Gallerist,\u201d as an art world influencer type with bleached eyebrows. They\u2019re not her first on screen credits, but they do show her range in addition to her ability to carry a film, even if she\u2019s playing a version of herself. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s a big moment for Charli xcx personally, too. She\u2019s a self-professed cinephile with a not-so-secret Letterboxd account, where she\u2019s logged 1,357 movies so far. In a recent review of \u201cPaddington 2,\u201d she wrote \u201clives up 2 the hype.\u201d Her four favorites are Paul Thomas Anderson\u2019s \u201cPhantom Thread,\u201d David Cronenberg\u2019s \u201cMaps to the Stars,\u201d Jacques Rivette\u2019s \u201cC\u00e9line and Julie Go Boating\u201d and Abel Ferrera\u2019s \u201cThe Addiction.\u201d<\/p>\n

To now be so fully entrenched in the filmmaking industry, she said, \u201chas been like everything and more.\u201d She also did a companion concept album for Emerald Fennell\u2019s upcoming \u201cWuthering Heights.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI really am sort of like desperate to like learn more and more and more about, you know, about every part of the film industry: Making a film, being in film. I\u2019m so hungry,\u201d she said. \u201cI feel so incredibly lucky that I\u2019ve been a part of the films that I have been part of thus far. I mean, like, to work with Aidan? To work with Gregg Araki? To do a (expletive) scene with like Natalie Portman? I\u2019m like what the (expective)?\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

For more coverage of the 2026 Sundance Film Festival, visit: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/sundance-film-festival<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PARK CITY, Utah (AP) \u2014 Charli xcx plays herself in \u201cThe Moment,\u201d a meta mockumentary about the end…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":542779,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[238153,58476,239213,185,114861,184846,168,109739,171,22016,57,239212,4646,84736,53,153760,124888,116180,100711,235115,124933,61,67,132,68,436,424],"class_list":{"0":"post-542778","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-aidan-zamiri","9":"tag-alexander-skarsgard","10":"tag-cathy-yan","11":"tag-celebrities","12":"tag-cooper-hoffman","13":"tag-david-cronenberg","14":"tag-domestic-news","15":"tag-emerald-fennell","16":"tag-entertainment","17":"tag-fairs-and-festivals","18":"tag-general-news","19":"tag-jacques-rivette","20":"tag-kylie-jenner","21":"tag-marty-supreme","22":"tag-movies","23":"tag-natalie-portman","24":"tag-park-city","25":"tag-paul-thomas-anderson","26":"tag-rachel-sennott","27":"tag-send-to-apple-news","28":"tag-sundance-film-festival","29":"tag-u-s-news","30":"tag-united-states","31":"tag-unitedstates","32":"tag-us","33":"tag-ut-state-wire","34":"tag-utah"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115958215243367545","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542778","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=542778"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542778\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/542779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=542778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=542778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=542778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}