LADY LIKE
PVOD (Jan. 3)

The underdog documentary Lady Like makes several interesting creative choices throughout its brief 87-minute running time. This helps ground the biographical look at the life and times of RuPaul's Drag Race season 14 runner-up Lady Camden (aka Rex Wheeler) in universally accessible emotions that are thankfully authentic. It also makes it something of a shame that the film never resonates as fully or as intimately as director Luke Willis inarguably intends.

Still, this is a divertingly arresting spectacle of glitz, glam, and perseverance. Narrated by fellow Drag Race alumna Nina West and utilizing heartfelt interviews with Camden/Wheeler, solidly realize reenactments of the drag superstar's North London childhood (centered on a lovely performance by youngster Shiloh Brody- Clarke), and pleasantly inspired animated sequences, Willis pulls out all the stops to document his subject's life story. It's hard to imagine that fans of the long-running competition program won't walk away from this doc feeling a sense of edified exhilaration.

The best bits are the segments where Rex discusses his love of dance, most notably his time at London's Royal Ballet School and subsequent work as a dancer and choreographer for the Sacramento Ballet. There's palpable joy there, and when these remembrances are coupled with the flashbacks to the artist as a child, most of these stories hit home with genuine, heartfelt eloquence. Add in the tragic death of Rex's older brother, and there's a mountain of moving material for viewers to fervently ascend.

All of which makes it frustrating that Willis refuses to dig too far beneath the surface. He also regurgitates the same material multiple times, creating a record that keeps repeating itself. The director allows for the bejeweled razzmatazz of Rex's drag success as Lady Camden to overwhelm the proceedings far too often. This undercuts the dancer's achievements as they face the raw personal tragedies and roadblocks they valiantly strive to overcome. It also makes the eventual heroic catharsis of the film's final sequences reverberate with far less authority than they should have possessed.

But there is an unavoidable warmth and tenderness to the documentary that I happily responded to. Rex is a dynamic performer, and it's easy to see (especially as someone who rather despises Drag Race) why he became a popular fan-favorite. If nothing else, I could easily see someone transforming Lady Like into an amalgam of rousing, crowd-pleasing, feature-length entertainment like (the admittedly dated) Outrageous!, Billy Elliot, Step Up, or The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. I'd buy a ticket, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.