Pamela: A Love Story Review
This article contains topics of alcohol abuse, sexual assault and rape. Read at your own discretion.
Pamela Anderson, the international sex symbol of the nineties, stars in the documentary titled, “Pamela: A Love Story”, where she shares about living as a romantic.
This remarkable film follows her during the Pandemic at her childhood home going through boxes of keepsakes filled with journals, videotapes and so much more.
While going through her personal effects she tells the story of her rise to fame, her marriage to Tommy Lee, their sex tape getting leaked and her journey through motherhood.
Anderson’s childhood home is located on the island of Ladysmith, Canada. Many of the shots are taken in her home or on the rocky beach outside.
The peaceful setting where she is telling the stories juxtaposes some of the unbelievable stories she shares that take place all over the world.
The documentary is started by her sharing some tougher topics from her youth.
She explained how her father was a drunk, that she was molested by a babysitter and was also raped in her early teen years.
She explained how these unfortunate events led to her being very uncomfortable with her body and how that played a role in the power she felt later in life when posing for “Playboy”.
From there, she went on to tell about when she first left the island and moved to Vancouver, where one of her girlfriends invited her to go to a football game.
The friend worked for “Labatt’s Beer”, who was paying for them to go to the game, so they were all wearing branded shirts.
Anderson ended up on the jumbotron, and from there was asked to do some commercials for Labatt. Shortly after that, “Playboy” reached out and asked her to be the cover of the October 1989 issue.
She accepted, and from there it was all history.
Modeling became a full-time gig, which led to her first acting job on “Baywatch”.
Following this, her career had lots of twists and turns. Her personal life also revved up.
Anderson dated a handful of celebrity men but did not get married until meeting “Mötley Crüe” drummer Tommy Lee.
They knew each other four days before they tied the knot.
Their love story is one that has generated lots of interest in the past and still today. While they were married a safe, filled with home movies, was stolen from their home.
This included their sex tape.
The Hulu original series “Pam and Tommy” portrays their relationship to a degree.
Towards the end of the documentary, Pamela comments on how this show was made without her consent and how she is upset by more people making money off a tape that never should have been seen.
A large amount of the documentary goes into detail on Anderson and Lee’s legal battle after the tape was released.
The second half of this documentary is very inspirational and shows how Anderson is a force to be reckoned with.
A large part of her career was feeling like she was not respected and that people only took her seriously because of her body.
They show this through a variety of late-night interviews where she is asked inappropriate questions about her breast implants and sex life.
However, she changed the narrative and became an animal rights activist with the organization “Peta”.
The end of the documentary shows Anderson preparing for her Broadway debut as Roxie in “Chicago”. She reflects on what has happened in the past and how she regrets none of it.
She comments on having several marriages that have all ended in divorce and then goes on to say she does not want to get married again because she thinks the reason none of her other marriages have worked out is that she never got over not being able to make it work with the father of her children.
This is a shame because earlier in the documentary she says, “I love to live a romantic life every day.”
This documentary shows Pamela Anderson in such a good light. The interview style is done in a way where it appears that Anderson wants to tell her story and not that the interviewers are forcing answers out of her.
They focus on talking to her but they also talk to her parents and her two sons.
Another aspect of the documentary is home videos from Anderson, along with lots of TV clips to show what her life was like in the nineties.
Also included are excerpts from Anderson’s journals. They show one scene where the interviewer asked her if she would be comfortable including entries from her journals.
Anderson agreed, however, she did not want to be the one to read them.
This film of course features a wide array of nudity from her playboy days. Also, there are difficult conversations about her childhood trauma along with talk of her and Lee’s leaked sex tape.
Even with the raunchier content, this documentary is definitely uplifting and shines a light on Anderson’s life that has never been shown before.
It seems like her side of the story has finally been told.
Rating: ⅘
Savannah Swartz is a second-year communications major. To contact her, email sms9072@psu.edu.
