The Greatest Love Story Never Told (2024)

The Greatest Love Story Never Told Review

Summary

Directed by Jason Bergh, “The Greatest Love Story Never Told” follows Jennifer Lopez as she endeavours on her most daring project yet: independently producing a new album and cinematic original that explore her twenty-year journey to self-love. This documentary is intimate and empowering, giving viewers an unfiltered access into Jennifer’s personal life whiles she works tirelessly to regain control over her own narrative with the creation of “This Is Me… Now”. From interviews with producing partners who have been there from day one such as Benny Medina or long-time collaborators such as Dave Meyers – this film provides a rare glimpse into some never-before-seen moments behind closed doors in Hollywood; it’s about time we got see what really goes on behind those beautiful faces.

Review

‘The Greatest Love Story Never Told’ Review: Jennifer Lopez Learns Love’s Cost in Revelatory Making-Of Doc

With his unexpectedly intimate chronicle of her $20 million passion project “This Is Me Now: A Love Story,” documentarian Jason Bergh chips away at the blocks on which Lopez’ pop superstardom was built.

When I heard about JLo’s ninth studio album “This Is Me… Now”, I couldn’t help but get excited she always brings something fresh and new to the table. She promised a more honest and vulnerable side than ever before (the bookend to 2002’s “This Is Me Then”), where she would finally open up about these decades-long romances that have been plastered all over tabloid pages worldwide with one-dimensional portrayals. But even being a lifelong fan myself–this made me skeptical because of how much control over her career Jenny has always maintained.

Between the record itself and its hour-long counterpart music video/movie thing (she released both together), not gonna lie pop emotionality is conveyed better than true intimacy sometimes by J.Lo. However, THIS third part media offensive cycle (yes I know it’s not a film but let’s just call everything a movie) is the most revelatory. “The Greatest Love Story Never Told” directed by Jason Bergh gives us what we need: an inside look into how complicated making “A Love Story” was for this woman whose every move seems so glamorous but who underneath wants desperately to be loved.

Bergh spends only about five minutes on the album, which itself was born out of her reunion with and subsequent marriage to Ben Affleck. Lopez wanted this record (let’s just call it that) to be about all the relationships she had that led up to meeting him. Then, as if sensing that would still leave something unsaid or seen? she wrote “A Love Story,” a series of music video-like vignettes that can be watched separately or together, depending on whether anyone pays for it. But once she signs with one studio, the unnamed shingle tells her they will not pay for any musical content (from J.Lo or anyone else). “It’s not like anybody was clamoring over the next J.Lo record,” she admits herself.

So then Jenny decides okay fine if no one else will shell out money for these videos then i guess i’ll do them myself… which historically in Hollywood has always been risky business according to Ben Affleck (one time he told me). So now with his blessing along with various other members from within close proximity such as Benny Medina – who should know better than most people given his role as manager director Dave Meyers (“I’m Real (Remix)”) is brought on board and logistics start getting coordinated because this might just turn out THE BIGGEST THING SHE’S EVER DONE.

Affleck gets nervous early on, especially when he finds out Lopez gave a gift from him a book of all their letters since they met to her music collaborators. But he knows she has to do this: It’s what artists are supposed to do, use their lives as fuel. Still, that doesn’t stop him from teasing her about making the protagonist a few years younger than she is; it’s the first sign that Bergh isn’t just going backstage but also trying to document her life and love with Affleck like nobody’s ever seen before.

The production stuff is remarkably frank: The original budget was $30 million later cut down to $20 million after she has to bankroll it herself and potential co-stars come and go, like Anthony Ramos (“In the Heights”), who opts to stay loyal to his buddy Marc Anthony, her ex-husband. “I’m not playing me,” she says. (Taylor Swift, Jason Momoa and Khloe Kardashian all pass or have scheduling conflicts when offered the roles of various Zodiac-sign roundtable members or fictional friends.) After Lopez reaches out to Jane Fonda, whom she befriended while shooting “Monster-in-Law” in 2005, the elder stateswoman first worries about even putting this album into the world and then frets over whether it will be seen as sincere or not. “I was so worried about Ben after the Grammys,” Fonda says of Affleck’s seeming grumpiness at the 2023 ceremony but then J.Lo sets her straight.

Between picking different viscosities of mud and worrying over an inoperable conveyor belt during some kind of transformative mud-nature act that I still don’t quite get, Lopez drops some unexpectedly insecure bombs and it hits hard. She talks about how “I didn’t think much of myself, And so the world didn’t think much of me” during these years apart from Affleck. She gets into the relationships with her narcissistic mother and workaholic father that made her so desperate to prove herself both personally and professionally. After shooting “Rebound,” a sequence where she is bound, sometimes violently, to one on-screen lover, she lets out a deep breath: “I’ve definitely been manhandled and a couple of other unsavory things,” she says.

When he tells her not to worry about it even though she’s worried it will be bad and then reveals he thinks it’s going to be great, you realize how much they love each other — and also how unacquainted with true failure she must be. You can tell she’s never put something out into the world with so much riding on it before, but you can also see that if not for his support which is both endless-seeming and very smart there would have been no way. That Bergh gives them such different personalities (there’s something perfect and darling about her total lack of interest in his excitement over Meyers’ truck full of camera lenses), yet shows how well they match up with each other, leaves the audience only further impressed by Affleck’s performance of their relationship.

The reality is that this nonfiction project is more successful than the theatricality of its cinematic predecessor. If anything, it makes you wish Lopez had mashed them together in one. According to design, “A Love Story” and “Never Told” were supposed to be companion pieces; but the emotional weight of the latter deepens the entertainment value of the former. Bergh’s documentary, on the other hand, provides a single account for the creative process (and even celebrity relationships) that may only be diluted by a series of “meta” musical interludes.

But even if unintentional, “The Greatest Love Story Never Told” does great justice to being great aspired by two other parts of this triad. Being covered pervasively and unflatteringly throughout her career not to mention benefiting from an all-encompassing documentary just two years ago with “Halftime,” Jennifer Lopez was at risk for overexposure when she entered her “This Is Me Now” era. Jason Bergh’s film achieves something unexpected by not only harnessing what drove her to stardom but also its maintenance (especially personal): giving people new eyes through which they can see themselves reflect in her.

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