Sofia Coppola's film “Priscilla” about Priscilla Presley

Above all, it is visually convincing: Sofia Coppola's film “Priscilla” tells the story of the woman at Elvis Presley's side, but avoids the risk of breaking through the beautiful appearance.

MWomen don't just put on makeup to please men. The act of adjusting oneself can also be one of self-empowerment, of determining one's own appearance, i.e. one's own body. Sofia Coppola directs him as such in her new film “Priscilla”. You can see individual body regions of the eponymous young woman in close-up during the beauty ritual: feet with red-painted toenails press into pink carpet fleece, an ink brush glides over her eyelashes, her eyes open for eyeliner. The image of Priscilla as the world came to know her, with highly teased hair and iconic cat eyes, as a woman alongside Elvis Presley, is made up of all these snapshots. But before we can look at the result of the preparation in its entirety, Coppola jumps back in her story and looks at the girl before she became a woman.

Still without make-up and with a ponytail of hazelnut brown hair, fifteen-year-old Priscilla sits in a milk bar on an American military base in gray post-war Germany. It's 1959, her father is stationed here, she goes to school and dreams of Elvis, who is also doing his military service at this base. A young soldier offers her to accompany him to an evening with Elvis. The first meeting with the already famous singer was a mutual, shy admiration. There is a tender kiss, Elvis introduces himself to her parents. Priscilla is in love, but he has to go back to the States. She dreams of him – and waits.