"Being cheeky and caring only about yourself" – that’s what fans of singer Charli xcx call "brat". Last summer's hottest pop trend has now been wrapped up for the big screen in 'The Moment' - a mockumentary where Charli plays herself in the lead role.
At the Berlinale, everything is usually red and gold - the Golden Bear, the red carpet, the red logo. But in the midst of these familiar festival colours, a glaring toxic green has muscled in this year - it is 'brat'.
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'brat' is the title of what is probably the best-known album by the British singer Charli xcx. But the term has long since stood for more than just music: for an attitude, a feeling for life, an aesthetic somewhere between self-empowerment and calculated provocation.
So why has this toxic green pop-cultural phenomenon suddenly turned up at the Berlinale and beyond? The answer can be found on the big screen as Charli xcx - whose real name is Charlotte Emma Aitchison - has presented her film debut 'The Moment'.
The mockumentary explores the highs and lows of success, the pressure of constant expectations and of self-staging - and of course, what is 'brat'.
Director Aidan Zamiri shows a personal side to the 33-year-old that we've ever seen before. Between pop myth and self-interrogation, a portrait emerges of an artist dissecting her own hype.
The Moment however does not take itself entirely seriously. Charli xcx plays the lead role and plays herself. Boundaries between documentary and staged material are deliberately blurred. The roughly 100-minute film offers glimpses behind the scenes and peers fleetingly into some dark and deep areas, but the overall tone is an exaggerated tone of satire.
In doing so, Charli xcx also processes the global boost 'brat' has given her career. She's been releasing music since 2008 and had her international breakthrough in 2014 with 'Fancy'. She was even part of the soundtrack for the worldwide box office smash 'Barbie', which dominated pop culture for an entire summer, if you recall.
But the following summer, she herself was the talk of the town. Her album 'Brat' gave rise to its own 'Brat summer' - a pop-cultural buzzword that became identity-shaping for some that they even had the word tattooed on their bodies.
What does 'brat' mean?
So what actually is 'brat'? Euronews asked her fans at the film's premiere.
For many, it is an attitude. "Being cheeky, rubbing people up the wrong way, liking yourself and at the same time not wanting to please anyone," said one woman.
Another primarily linked it with freedom: "Being free, being wild [...] I also associate it very much with summer and with the feeling that you are allowed to do whatever you feel like."
Others again describe 'brat' as conscious exaggeration - somewhere between escapism and irony. It is about "enjoying the last moment of a slowly sinking humanity - extremely depressing and at the same time very ironic," said another fan.
Somewhere between defiance, summer fantasy and end-of-the-world mood, it became clear: 'brat' is less a clearly defined term than a projection screen.
Attention as the toughest currency
In the film itself, 'brat' also strikes softer, darker notes. Between self-staging and permanent visibility, the feeling grows of losing yourself. The hype that had just been uplifting suddenly feels like a mechanism that has taken on a life of its own.
Charli xcx herself spoke about this moment of losing control. When art reaches a wider public.
"In my case, the widest audience I had ever reached - the opinions of that audience began to act on the work. It changes, its meaning shifts. With success comes 'this feeling of losing control of something that I had had control over for so long."
'The Moment' thus sketches more than just a portrait of an artist. The film paints a picture of an industry in which attention has become the toughest currency - accelerated by social media and an economy driven by constant one-upmanship. Artists are under pressure not only to remain relevant but to keep on outdoing themselves.
This dynamic can be summed up in a pointed piece of advice quoted in the film from Kylie Jenner - fictitiously phrased but with a real core: "As soon as you think people are sick of you, you have to go even more over the top."
A line that sounds like a sober bit of industry logic and at the same time hints at how far artistic self-staging has already shifted in an era where the grabbing of attention is constant.
