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It's so strange to read positive reviews when critics, at that time, were all against her, but times change and, above all, ways of thinking's change. Here is a more than positive review of the documentary 30 years after its release! Published by 'Rolling Stone' ''Everyone copied 'In bed with Madonna', nobody did better'' link Truth or Dare - Rolling Stone review Blonde on Blonde: ‘Madonna: Truth or Dare’ at 30 Thirty years later, Alex Keshishian’s behind-the-scenes look at Madonna on her ‘Blond Ambition’ tour remains the template for the modern pop-star documentary By DAVID FEAR She doesn’t have to clean up the hotel room. You usually don’t get to spend time in luxury French hotel suites like this one unless you’re rich and megafamous, and when you get to be that rich and megafamous, you have plenty of people to clean up your messes. But the woman in the robe is still picking up the champagne flutes, pushing a tray of ice buckets into the corner, quietly tidying up the aftermath of a celebration. She’s talking about fear and anxiety and how last week, she was convinced she was having a nervous breakdown in Spain. The lights go out, she lays her weary head to rest, and the camera lingers on her, capturing what feels like an extremely vulnerable moment. It’s August of 1990. Instagram will not be invented for another 20 years, and TMZ won’t slouch toward Bethlehem for another 15. Twitter is not even a gleam in Jack Dorsey’s eye yet. In this late-Mesozoic era of celebrity culture, the curating of a famous person’s image is still outsourced, publicity is still a commodity, and privacy is still a bargaining chip. But this woman, a bona fide pop star who’s allowing someone to film her while she opens up directly to the camera and throws away empty Heineken bottles and sleeps? Bitch, she’s Madonna. And as was characteristic with everything else the singer/dancer/cultural icon had a well-manicured hand in, she’s gleefully rewriting the rules of the game in real time. A tour chronicle, a time capsule and a template, Madonna: Truth or Dare announced itself as something different the moment it premiered on May 10th, 1991. What started as an idea to shoot a few of her Blonde Ambition shows ended up becoming the blueprint for how to inject performative candor into pop-music documentaries — it doesn’t pull back the curtain on the backstage tantrums, the blood-sweat-tears hard work or the bitchy celebrity encounters so much as integrate them into the spectacle you’re seeing onstage. It’s all one big Madonna-drama-rama. And yet you still feel like you’re getting a portrait of an artist as a control freak that feels uniquely raw, semi-filtered, off-book if not off-camera. This is pop stardom as provocation verité. They should’ve called it Truth *and* Dare. The backstory has now become Her Madge-esty lore: Having seen filmmaker Alex Keshishian’s Harvard thesis (a pop-fueled take on Wuthering Heights), Madonna requests a meeting. They hit it off. He’s hired to shoot concert footage and some behind-the-scenes tidbits for a possible special on the upcoming tour, and is quickly whisked off to Japan. While there, he begins interviewing the show’s dancers, a hodgepodge of European, Asian, Hispanic and African-American men who are as integral to the stage show as the musicians. Because he can only pin them down to talk in the morning after they’ve come home from a night of post-performance partying, Keshishian conducts most of their interviews in bed. He realizes that he’s getting good stuff here. Ditto the backstage and after-hours exchanges. After showing Madonna some of what he’s shot, he pitches a pivot to something bigger, broader, more intimate than a concert movie. She agrees, and despite the protestations of her management, allows him and his crew to keep the cameras rolling longer after the house lights have gone up. You want to shoot Madonna reciting fart poems to her makeup artists, and tearing stage managers a new asshole over faulty monitors, and having an awkward exchange with her her dad after he’s witnessed her humping a bed onstage? Here’s your all-access pass, Alex. The end result remains a tantalizing mix of performance footage and Madonna-after-dark shenanigans, steely professionalism and NSFW personal fretting. This is Madonna you tend to think of when you think of her: the post-bracelets-and-lace blonde bombshell, all sinew and Gaultier corsets. (We stan the Cabaret droog look as well. ) But thirty years later, it practically plays like a greatest-hits album of private moments turned into pop-cultural touchstones: The water bottle. Kevin Costner calling the show “neat.” The Toronto cops turning “Like a Virgin” into a first-amendment Rubicon. The same-sex kiss. Blatantly flirting with Antonio Banderas. (The real hero of this doc? Antonio Banderas’ infinitely tolerant wife.) The montage of Madonna goofing around with her dancers between the sheets. The Pride parade. The clucking over a story involving an affair with the troupe’s one self-identified straight dancer. Warren Freakin’ Beatty. Everyone remembers Beatty’s great deathblow send-off — “She doesn’t want to live off-camera, much less talk…. Why say something if it’s off-camera? What point is there existing?” — but his real highlight arguably comes before that, when he’s watching the backstage circus blow through Madonna’s dressing room. As he watches her take her makeup off, he stands silently behind, hands on her shoulders. He stares straight into the camera and by extension, at the crew filming the whole encounter. And then he smiles and, with perfect movie-star timing, shakes his head. This is a man who has been famous for decades, and he doesn’t understand why someone would want their most mundane or messy exchanges captured for an audience. Madonna can’t understand why you wouldn’t give that to the public — shouldn’t a peek behind the curtain be a perk you control? This is how fame would be handled and managed in the 21st century, a sort of direct exchange between fan and artist. Mystique would be replaced by relatability, and Truth or Dare turns the whole celebrity thing into a balancing act. Madonna — she’s just like you, folks. She gets angry and depressed and occasionally has an off night. And also, don’t you wish you were hanging out with her and having these fabulous, once-in-a-lifetime experiences reserved for the stratospherically famous too? Truth or Dare remains groundbreaking in so many ways, from its gamble on showcasing what happens when people stop being nice and start getting real, to its depiction of gay life — a decade after AIDS began decimating the community, almost a decade before Will & Grace started selling it to the mainstream. It’s the way Madonna is writing her own warts-and-all narrative here that makes this the single most influential music documentary since Dylan’s Don’t Look Back, however. Everyone from Beyoncé to Bieber to Billie Eilish would attempt to replicate its mixture of brutal, behind-the-scenes honesty and big-tent showmanship — you don’t get Queen Bey admitting she’s insecure as she’s inches away from a camcorder or a depressed Katy Perry sobbing before a show without Madge showing them how it’s done. The difference is that few of today’s pop stars have the confidence or bravery to trust someone outside their team to capture a truth that isn’t vetted or micromanaged to death. After a 25th anniversary screening at the Museum of Modern Art (which Madonna herself allegedly crashed for a brief second), Keshishian admitted that he’d been approached over the years by numerous big-name musicians who claimed to want the full Truth or Dare treatment. He’d film for a week with carte blanche, he said, then cut together what he had. “’Well, we don’t want you to use that part, and I don’t want you to show me doing this.’ I’d say to [their] management, ‘There’s no movie here.’” There are too many layers to go through now, Keshishian said. With Truth or Dare, he essentially needed Madonna’s sign-off, and that was it. What she said was what they did, a stressed-out Liz Rosenberg and Freddy DeMann be damned. And what she wanted was something close to a gorgeously shot version of the ugly truth, 24 frames per second. She got it, or at the very least, one hell of a legend to print. Madonna always loved to take chances and push boundaries. This documentary was a gamble that, 30 years later, is still paying off.

This thread is literally the perfect example of 'Misery loves company'

Can someone just leak some rehearsals already? I remember we had some RHT studios while she was still on the road with the tour. I just want Future and Rescue Me tour demos ???

A 2 hours twins doing random things b-roll

The album Madame X seems to be a widely criticized and divisive album on the forum. It was praised by most critics as being bold, innovative, and exciting and as a return to Madonna the artist. The fans seem to have a much more negative reception towards it. The album is approaching its 2 year anniversary and the inevitable release of the tour film, I thought this would be the perfect time to poll where this fanbase stands on the album! Please vote and I hope you will comment more so below. Remember to be accepting of other people's opinions!

Truth Or Dare remains the pinnacle piece of work for me in terms of showing Madonna to the world. It covers her music, live performances, her activism, her fame, her fearlessness... everything! It covers all areas of her life (at the time) and really shows what she was made of. If someone asked me “Why do you love Madonna so much?” I wouldn’t play them one of her albums, I’d show them ToD and say “this is why...”

I'm sure most people on here know my obsession and love for Madame X. I regard it as her best piece of work yet! The music is so inventive and it featured the return of my favorite M producer: Mirwais. I remember listening for the first time and being blown away. I immediately fell in-love with the album. It did strike me as so different and bizarre compared to her past works but that's what made me appreciate it even more. It stands out so much in her discography and she once again served quality after years of writing camps and trend chasing. The music has so many layers, to this day I feel like I am still discovering new sounds in the songs. I feel as though she combined all of my favorite things into one album: politics, electronic, and experimental sounds. I think I will always hold this album as my top favorite!

on the front page of Lil Buck's clothing line https://www.ffoclothing.com/ so i guess we exactly know now what this shoot was made for

if we leak diplo's nudes will he release it for us

A requeast? God save the Queens English.

To be honest i never listen to the album. Too dark and too many directions (reggaetton, classical music, reggae, disco, 90's dance, african beats....) and not one strong standout track that really blows away. It was nice for 5 minutes in 2019 but that's it.... and i am so over the Madame X personna and even the name, everytime she posts a red X i'm like meh... I don't know why she tries so hard to push that non-eventful era down our throat two years later, move on already and give us a fresh new era/album that suits your beautiful new leeks !

i freakin love it. still listening regularly and gets better and better with time.

I chose mediocre as well. Some songs are stand outs for me and I love them but some songs I just have to skip by because they get right on my nerves. I might have liked the album more if she used the looks she is using now for the cover. LOL .. and I still haven't gotten over the strings to the face pic of Rebel Heart, just yucky lookin to me - especially knowing how good she looks.

I chose "mediocre" although it's not my exact feeling. I still listen to it, I like it but I don't love it and here are the reasons: - extremely incoherent; the soul of the album goes from track 5 to 10, the Portuguese part; I never go after track 10 - wrong production that tries to appeal a young public; bad results with the choice to sing with grillz and too much autotune - very repetitive lyrics

what thread is this?

I can't get over the fact you can have "Bitch i'm loca" and "Dark ballet" on the same album... i mean could you imagine "Bitch i'm loca" on Ray of light for example ?! I agree not every albums have to be totally cohesive but to certain extent. Here the jump is way too big, it gives a messy feel to it as a whole. A beautiful cohesive sonically album is still way more class, imo.

I love the Madame X album and it's her most solid and cohesive work since Confessions. It's not my favorite favorite but it stands up better than Hard Candy,MDNA,and Rebel Heart (a few standout tracks but overall trash). There are a couple recycleable tracks (Bitch I'm Loca & Funana are the ones that came to my mind,the latter doesn't affect the album since it's just a bonus but it shouldn't have been released at all) but overall they don't hinder the overall scope of the album. I think her working with Mirwais again helped significantly as well as tightening up security on her hard drives so there wasn't a massive leak of the album before its release (Rebel Heart). I genuinely believe this album was the step in the right direction she needed to take and I hope her next album is even better than MX.

Okay I’ll just change to Neutral to avoid confusion haha

Blame Ariana for the mumbling. Girl sings with a mouth full of marbles

I mean yes and no. Mediocre can refer to something not good and/or not bad but people usually use the word when they refer to something of low quality and barely passable. I think that's where the confusion on the use of the word is coming from because I view the word mediocre more as something that closely borders on 'it sucks' than something that's neither good or bad.

Confessions in a Bathtub

I like a few songs but ... it‘s one of the worst.

It's great, I love it. Even if there's a few skips, I still rank it very highly. My only complaint is the mumbling vocal styling all throughout the album. I just wish that wasn't a thing. I pray for clear enunciation on the next album

I love it!! ?❤

I WANT WORLD PRIDE 2019 FULL PROFESSIONALLY FILMED SHOW!!!

Most probably we'll get nothing, or just an edit of the workshop already shared and documented on her Insta, who knows... IMHO these days that she posts lots of backstage and workshop stuff on Insta i really don't need any backstage footage as an extra on the BD/DVD, unless is completely new footage. I'll be happy with a physical release, BD/2CDs combo with beautiful artwork and a great booklet AND THE F*CKING FULL SHOW.

I think that Madonna has earned the right to post as she pleases.

Its been a minute since MDNA Skin huh? Surely she's aligning her new ads to drop around the time of the DVD for Maximum exposure. They may even be set to some sort of music of hers. A minute and a half You Tube / Social ad with her music behind it counts as a stream so...get money. Madame X is a hustler.

Why no one likes I'm Addicted? ? Such an amazing song, to me it's one of the best of the decade.

Madonna recorded her bits and then a Missy rap was included. Also M is a huge fan of Missy and has always been supportive and kind to her as well as Dua. She didn't film due to injury. Not everything needs to be drama for the sake of it.

Supernatural Goodbye to Innocence or Up Down Suite?

Die Another Day Supernatural or Your Honesty?

Dark Ballet is literally one of her worst. That dirg of a melody and verse with tired old cliches and love dove glove rhyming slang. Brilliant video and cute idea with the breakdown but too random to make it work. Is also completely destroys the flow of the album right off the bat. Medellin gets you going then its like being in a morgue. I like Madame X and its ambition a lot but regretfully I never listen to it despite liking a good few of the songs. Medellin God Control Future Crave Come Alive Batuka Extreme Occident Killers IDSIF Looking For Mercy (this could have been one of her best ever with a better chorus. That verse and bridge are other worldly. Would have made a pretty solid 10 track album but literally every song bar maybe God Control & Crave is under written and that's compensated for by bells and whistles. There's just something very empty about a bunch of her work with Mirwais despite it being intricate and considered. I genuinely think the album could have been one of her greatest ever hands down but it works more like a mood board and grazing tapas plate rather than a five course meal.

Agreed, the lack of leaks made everything smoother because Madonna didn't have to go back and quickly re-mix everything. Her original vision for the songs made it through to the end.

Express Yourself Masterpiece or Miles Away?

So I begrudgingly put on MDNA today and listened straight through as I went to the gym. And wow Masterpiece is truly THAT SONG! Now I know this song was written for her movie, but were there any other songs written during that session? This song is leaps and bounds ahead of everything else on MDNA.

It’s one of my most favorite Madonna ballads. Her voice is so beautiful and emotional that it can make me cry.

X-rays of her hip and we will deal

Connection issues, sorry ? Won't speak again, I'm embarrassed now

Ohhh, I forgot about it It would be awesome since it was professionally recorded

Agree, it really is a Masterpiece that song. I remember hearing it over the credits and wondering where I could buy it. Imagine my appraise when I saw i already had it on MDNA CD, which I had only listened to a couple of times!

I think she just really wanted the world to take her movie seriously. Rumour has it she purposely had the song start late in the credits so it wouldn't be eligible for an Academy Award. But yet she still won a Golden Globe.

For me it was the chatting and joking, even though she wasnt well. She seemed hilarious and tipsy.

She mentioned Surround Sound in her last post I miss the surround mix in the MDNA and Rebel Heart DVD's.. You can say what ever you want about the S&S tour sound mix.. But the DTS 5.1 stereo mix is flawless.. Since the opening scene you can hear the sounds moving around,for example the tick tack tick tack

This time it's Erotica Justify My Love or Take a Bow?

Crave Erotica or Justify my Love?

I also believe she is cooking something in secret...

I'm manifesting "American Life" digital remixes EP and HD remastered ORIGINAL video this Friday. Too good to be true, right? ("Nothing Really Matters" digital single would be cool, too).