"DEMI LOVATO: DANCING WITH THE DEVIL" // SXSW 2021
Demi Lovato, the 28-year-old singer, is a Disney kid turned pop sensation. She's become a queer icon, has been nominated for a Grammy twice and has an unmistakable (and utterly powerful) voice. She's also a singer with a lot of demons and a very hard past that has come back knocking many times. The new documentary DEMI LOVATO: DANCING WITH THE DEVIL showcases Demi at her most raw, opening up and speaking about health, mental illness and the 2018 overdose that nearly took her life. This documentary comes to SXSW by way of YouTube Originals and is now currently unspooling there in mini-series form. She's openly candid about her overdose, her addictions and her mental health past and present and shares them here, hoping to help others by telling her story.
Demi's story is told in four episodes and it's clear that she wants to set the record straight on many issues, both about her and her friends. One of which has received a lot of unwarranted heat from her own fans thinking that she was one of the reasons for Demi's overdose when in fact said friend wasn't even aware that Demi had been using again. But sure enough, after six years of sobriety, she started up again, smoking crack cocaine and methamphetamines, often mixing them with alcohol. The night of her overdose we find out that she had people over for her birthday but no one there knew she was using again. Once they all left for the night, she returned to using and smoked opioids laced with fentanyl. Luckily her assistant found her body, which at that point had turned blue, and got her to the hospital. Without that stroke of luck, she most likely wouldn't be here today. The overdose left her partially blind when she finally woke and during her weeks long recovery she had multiple strokes. When she first arrived at the hospital the doctors were not even sure if she was going to make it. Demi also reveals that as her memory of that evening returned, she realized that the drug dealer she called that evening raped her and left her alone to overdose. Shockingly, we never do find out if this man has faced or will face criminal charges (or if anyone but Demi knows his identity) and that's one of several important factors that ends up seemingly skipped over due to lack of time (the episodes are 20 to 30 minutes when the story is screaming for 60 minute plus episodes).
Demi's story is shocking and powerful and it is nothing short of a miracle of a recovery that she is here to tell it herself. Director Michael D. Ratner does a good job of bringing the story to us (Dancing with the Devil actually replaces a scrapped doc that was being made at the time of her overdose showcasing her current tour). And Demi deserves mountains of credit for having the courage to tell it in the first place. But by brisking past so much trauma in her life without even attempting to delve into it (including her rape at 15-years-old, which was ignored by the studio when she reported it), it leaves not a feeling of wanting more but needing to hear more. Needing her story expanded and looked further into. That being said, DEMI LOVATO: DANCING WITH THE DEVIL is still a powerful look into her life and recovery (even with the out-of-place animated opening credits that's way too cheesy for the raw material within) and one that will no doubt shine a light of hope for countless others out there dealing with their own traumas.
GRADE: B+
DIRECTED BY Michael D. Ratner FEATURING Demi Lovato, Matthew Scott Montgomery FEATURED AS PART OF THE 2021 SXSW FESTIVAL. FOR MORE INFO: DEMI LOVATO: DANCING WITH THE DEVIL