The story of Karen Carpenter. It's all about her rise to fame and her battle with anorexia which killed her at the far too young age of 32. It's all done using dolls to portray the people. Also they show what was going on in the world at the time and cards explaining how anorexia destroys women. This is a deadly serious short and VERY depressing. I almost was in tears as you see and hear Karen trying to fight the disease. It also portrays her family very badly. Her brother is shown as being gay and verbally abusive. Her mother comes across as a controlling witch. Harrowing but fascinating.This has supposedly banned due to unauthorized use of the Carpenters music but I saw it uncut on YouTube.

There are two possible ways which approach to give to the 43-minute short film "Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story". The first would be to see it as a historic documentary about a culture phenomenon and the tragic fate of a young woman who was among the biggest stars of her generation. The second would be to see it as a documentary film that teaches us about the horrors of anorexia. You have to decide yourself what path you take or if you try to see it as a mixture of both. This film was written and directed by Todd Haynes, early in his career, over 25 years ago. He went on to become an Academy Award nominee later. The best thing about this short film is probably the music. Some wonderful songs in here that are very catchy and have been covered so many times. My favorite is probably "Rainy Days and Mondays", but there are many other great recording in here as well. A really interesting short film. It is probably personal preference as to how much you like the doll sequences and re-enactments, but for me they were fine. Highly recommended.

I'm not a Carpenters fan. it's not that I don't like them; it's just that I don't listen to them. but my lack of prior familiarity with the subject did not diminish the movie-experience.the structure of this movie is pretty much bizarre. it's made up of a mix between stock footage with voice over and "live action" segments, acted out by Barbie dolls. and of course there's the illegal Carpenters soundtrack...yet "bizarre" is somehow effective. though some images were a bit over-played (showing boxes of ex-lax; male hands; a woman being beaten by a man), the stock footage (and other real-life footage) was a very effective way of setting the tone of the film, and providing background knowledge about anorexia, and the Carpenters in general. the choice of using Barbies as "actors" has obvious symbolism (female has to be skinny, big-breasted, etc.), yet despite minimal physical movement of the characters themselves, the voice-acting was so good that it worked.10/10 on the voice-acting. and the sets! the backgrounds had so much detail that it was a shame I was only watching a grainy copy with tiny aspect ratio.I give the movie overall an 8.5/10 because even though I think it did a wonderful job at accomplishing what it was meant to do (make a societal critique about anorexia and the treatment of women by discussing Karen Carpenter's story), it had some technical issues/concerns (not being able to read titles because the background was the same color; using same footage repeatedly), and I just, personally, don't prefer issues being presented so blatantly.but still something pretty much everyone should watch.

As a die-hard Carpenters fan, people find it hard to believe that I like this film. At first, the "campy-ness" seems an insult to Karen's memory. But the more I watched it, the more I came to realize that this film was, and is, very sympathetic to Karen and her struggles. Not only did the poor soul fight for recognition in her family, but she had to fight for her own life. Unfortunately, the latter battle was lost.But Karen's legacy is bigger than anything her family could have imagined. On February 4, 2008, we will commemorate the twenty-fifth anniversary of her death. Since then, many young girls have been save from self-starvation. How many? Hundreds, perhaps thousands. We'll never know. But somewhere, when a parent hears Karen's voice, they say a prayer of thanks to the woman whose death may have saved their own daughter's life.I think Todd Haynes created a chilling and all-too-accurate portrait of a young woman at odds with her family and herself. He "directed" the dolls very realistically, and the dream-like quality of the film evokes the confusion of the beautiful, tortured soul that was Karen Carpenter.