Originally Posted by
Guy
I really liked the documentary. However, I agree with Carlo and Reese that the omission of her 20+ year post-"Private Dancer" recording career is curious. Tina is a fantastic singer and an electrifying performer. One of my favorites and I love her recordings. I would have loved more information on her creative process as a solo recording artist.
But this is for the masses and Tina is only one thing to the masses...a survivor. So it required gruesome exposition of the saddest and darkest period of her life.
This comment from the review is interesting. I don't fully agree that Tina avoided "commodification" of 'victimhood.' What struck me about the documentary was the overarching narrative that prior to her 'comeback' [[and throughout her career) Tina was COMPELLED by others to talk about Ike and relive her past.
Ike & Tina were well-known but they only had one big hit. They were truly "cult" artists renowned for their performances. Tina is an exceptional talent but she could have disappeared into the ether alongside other exceptional Black female singers who came along in the 60s.
Ultimately, she made a choice to reveal the horrific details of her life as a long-suffering victim of abuse at the hands of Ike Turner. That is the underpinning of her entire career as a solo artist -- overcoming trauma and adversity to finally step into the light as a survivor and superstar.
Books, a movie, a Broadway musical, and now, a documentary have all told this same narrow Tina Turner story. Certainly, when Oprah entered her commercial orbit during promotion of Tina's "Wildest Dreams" album -- which yielded no major hits in the U.S. -- it was no longer about Tina as a recording artist. She became a canonized, Oprah-endorsed monument of triumph over trauma and adversity. This increased her drawing power and sustained her for 3 more successful world tours.
It is her life and her story. It is her right to tell it and use it as she pleases. The part of her narrative that inspires is that she triumphed over trauma and abuse. She understands that and has leveraged, to her economic advantage, whatever hurt, trauma and inconvenience was occasioned by having to spend 5 decades talking about the details of her life with Ike.
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