Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour (Taylor's Version) (Disney+) Movie Review (2024)

The concert epic that shook the blockbuster landscape to the tune of a quarter of a billion, Eras is a thoroughly grand and impressively choreographed celebration of the sheer star power of Taylor Swift.

After a thoroughly uncertain period of cinematic recovery post-pandemic, with movie theatres flailing from a succession of perhaps unexpected disappointments - Fast X, Indy 5, and basically everything from DC (Shazam 2, The Flash, Blue Beetle), but most tragically the underperforming Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part 1 - something equally unexpected happened: Barbenheimer, $2.5 billion later in Box Office returns, with hopes driven high by this Maverick-like boost for cinemas worldwide, and the SAG-AFTRA strikes truly made their prolonged impact felt, delaying over three dozen release dates, and affecting the filming of many more movies and TV shows.

Into the gaping abyss stepped Taylor Swift. Not Paramount, or Universal, or Warner. Taylor Swift, side-stepping the conventional distribution model to partner up with movie theatres themselves and unleash what would come to be the most unlikely film success of the end of 2023, uncovering hidden potential in the concert movie realm and disrupting the traditional distribution model at a time when many film studios were likely already reeling from multiple Box Office flops (released not long after, Disney's The Marvels cost as much to make as the $15 million budget Eras attracted at the Box Office, and certainly didn't recover it). Whether or not Studios will learn any lessons from both the Barbenheimer phenomenon (they certainly didn't learn them quick enough to capitalise on #Exorswift) and Swift's Halloween Hail Mary, there's no denying the entertainment spectacle of the latter, which now finally lands - much anticipated - on Disney+, following a hefty $70 million bidding war, coming shaped in an even longer 210 minute version for audiences to foot-tap or jaw-drop their way through.

Fashioned from footage shot across a trio of nightly performances at the start of Swift's live concert Eras Tour in August 2023, the film encapsulates this 169 minute concert extravaganza, attempting to bring the live experience first to cinema audiences and now to the home forum, where it can be revelled in not only in its extended digital version but this new, even longer, "Taylor's Version" 3.5 hour cut, whilst also getting it in 4K Dolby Vision HDR - with home audiences likely hoping they've got a decent enough sound setup to enjoy the bracing Dolby Atmos concert experience also provided here.

Split into 10 Acts ("Eras"), the tracklist is as follows:

LOVER

1. Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince
2. Cruel Summer
3. You Need to Calm Down
4. Lover
5. The Archer (Digital and Taylor's Version Exclusive)

FEARLESS

1. Fearless
2. You Belong With Me
3. Love Story

EVERMORE

1. Willow
2. Marjorie
3. Champagne Problems
4. Tolerate It

REPUTATION

1. Ready for It?
2. Delicate
3. Don't Blame Me
4. Look What You Made Me Do

SPEAK NOW

1. Enchanted
2. Long Live (Digital and Taylor's Version Exclusive)

RED

1. 22
2. We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together
3. I Knew You Were Trouble
4. All Too Well

FOLKLORE

1. The 1
2. Betty
3. The Last Great American Dynasty
4. August
5. Illicit Affairs
6. My Tears Ricochet
7. Cardigan (Taylor's Version Exclusive)

1989

1. Style
2. Blank Space
3. Shake It Off
4. Wildest Dreams (Digital and Taylor's Version Exclusive)
5. Bad Blood

SURPRISE

1. Our Song
2. You're on Your Own, Kid

MIDNIGHTS

1. Lavender Haze
2. Anti-Hero
3. Midnight Rain
4. Vigilante sh*t
5. Bejeweled
6. Mastermind
7. Karma

Credits and Acoustic Collection:

1. Long Live (Taylor's Version Exclusive)
2. I Can See You (Taylor's Version Exclusive)
3. Death By A Thousand Cuts (Taylor's Version Exclusive)
4. Our Song
5. You Are In Love (Taylor's Version Exclusive)
6. Maroon (Taylor's Version Exclusive)
7. You're On Your Own, Kid

Kick-starting with a left-field chorus, The Eras Tour shows its teeth right from the get-go, Swift rising on the stage like a fully-formed superstar superhero - think Robert Downey Jr's Tony Stark / Iron Man landing on the stage in Iron Man 2), you get a few catchy memories in Cruel Summer (and tears-of-joy audience members singing along) and a pretty quick sense of what's to come: set changes shifting to an office environment for The Man highlighting just one of the many, many set and costume switches that effortlessly punctuate this journey.

It's not just the sets either, with each Era redefining the entire backdrop and 'flavour' of that Act, Evermore feeling more forest-driven in its fairytale aesthetic, Reputation going snake-centric, and Red being, well, you know. Across the duration there are some lovely little nods and interactions, with Swift always remembering the beloved audience surrounding here, interacting with them superbly (the exercise of her 'superpower' as she uses her finger to direct the audience's cheers is excellent), and, perhaps more importantly, always remembering to have infectious fun on this journey (punching the air with the microphone in place of a word).

Of course it's nice to see her crack her guitar out frequently, and even set up at the piano, and whilst, at 3+ hours, there are understandably quite a few lesser known (at least to non-Taylor-superfans) tracks in there, the bigger numbers are absolutely spectacular and really draw the applause and engagement from the fully invested, enthralled crowd. The insane number of seamless, clever, sometimes even on-stage, costume changes are impressive as all hell, as well as that sublime set design, with epic staging of the settings for the tracks, Taylor veritably acting out the setup in preparation for her performance - it's the kind of all-round star act that only the best singers pull off, knowing just how to entertain and intoxicate their audience.

The "best" Era may be subjective; Reputation's setpieces are absolutely showstopping but Red's 22/Back Together/Trouble combo is hard to beat... that is, until 1989's offering of the likes of Blank Space, Shake it Off and Bad Blood, providing arguably some of the most punchy (LFE driven) moments in the entire concert. However the real underlying magic across the entire production is clearly Swift's ability to effortlessly build up her foaming fans to proper crescendo heights, before bringing them back down to earth with a few more acoustically-inflected country pieces, before building them back up to frothing insanity - the repeated cycle both exhilarating and exhausting, and perfectly structured to keep you utterly engaged.

The Eras Tour is a loving celebration of a writer/singer superstar performer at the absolute height of her game, delivered as an unprecedented, epic spectacle, and almost perfectly packaged as a film version that does a pretty damn good at putting you at the heart of it all (even if nobody sane is going to do 3.5 hours of this in one sitting at home in the same way that they might enjoy at a concert). If you're a die-hard Swiftie, you'd likely already given this an 11/10 before even watching it, but even those more casual fans will be hard pressed not to get drawn in by the magic, energy and sheer fun of it all.

Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour (Taylor's Version) comes to Disney+ in 4K Ultra HD with Dolby Vision HDR and Dolby Atmos from 15th March 2024.

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