Critics reviews

For every moment I knew was coming, there was another that took me by surprise. The one thing I didn’t expect was how genuine the film would feel, the sympathy it would dredge up for me. It rekindled a connection to Swift as a person, beyond my nostalgia for her early albums, that I haven’t felt in a long time.

A compelling and thoughtful portrait of an artist reckoning with what she’s capable of, and, more interestingly, what the culture will accept from her. 

“Miss Americana” is 85 minutes of translucence with Taylor Swift. There’s more in it — and more to it — than you usually get with these pop superstar portraits. I, at least, don’t recall loneliness being such a predominant condition for Swift’s peers as it is, here, for her.

The documentary wisely doesn’t linger on the woe-is-me issues, but their effect permeates every scene. Perhaps the saddest moment comes at the end, when Swift contemplates the idea that, as she reaches 30, her time in the spotlight is limited—that she is on her way to an “elephant graveyard” of no-longer-young women stars.