Over the past year, Taylor Swift has been across the United States for her current tour, the Eras Tour. Uniquely, Instead of highlighting one album as we have seen numerous artists do in the past, she has decided to create one tour “spanning 17 years of music” and taking the viewer on a trip throughout her career and 10 albums. The Eras Tour has been extremely successful, having now added international dates as well, and to encapsulate the US leg, Taylor created a concert film to play in theaters.

The trailer for the Eras Tour movie can be seen here

Going into the movie, I already knew it was going to be special, but as I got there I saw tons of people of all ages dressed in Taylor Swift merch, wearing their Cardigan’s, and even homemade outfits that were nods to her discography. The Theater Companies took hold of the Swiftie’s excitement as well, making tons of exclusive merch and posters alongside the Era’s Tour themed cups and popcorn buckets that are sold everywhere.

The movie opens as Taylor enters the stage, a mashup of her many hits playing in the background, building great suspense as dancers walk the stage with large parachutes that almost represent wings, eventually coming together and covering a space on the stage where Taylor appears moments later. She goes immediately into the Lover Era, singing that “It’s been a long time comin’” from her song Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince. 

However, following this, the first missing song occurs. The Archer, along with many other songs that had places on The Eras Tour set list were cut, which was my first critique of the movie. Personally, I was eager to see many of these songs, such as her performance of No Body, No Crime with the HAIM sisters, who were some of her many openers on the tour. Another large loss was Cardigan not making the cut, one of the most popular songs off of her album Folklore. 

This disappointment did not last for long, as the start of the next era was shortly after. The movie did an amazing job at utilizing every moment, even the seemingly meaningless time in between eras where costume and set changes would be, highlighting the visual effects and instrumentation of the stage.

One era that stood out to me was the Folklore Era. The album, known for its amazing lyricism and storytelling, was brought to life on the stage through the use of costume and set design. Swift brought out a huge cottage looking set/structure that she resided in for most of the set. And during songs like The Last Great American Dynasty, her actors had an astounding time to shine as they wore large ballgowns as they danced around her. 

Later on, Swift announces to the audience that they have “reached the acoustic set,” a moment in the show that had been awaited by many fans during the US tour’s run. The acoustic set has been done by Swift for years, allowing her to have a unique moment each show where fans get to hear songs from her discography that she doesn’t play every night. In the movie, I felt that the weight of the acoustic set was not given the credit it deserves. It has been an iconic moment in Swift’s tours, and often fans could be seen on social media showing the songs they wanted to hear as their surprise songs most. Despite the lacking entrance this section got, I felt that the choices she made for the 2 highlighted songs were perfect. First, she played Our Song from her Debut album, which is an Album/Era left out of the usual tour set list. The song was a complete blast from the past and gave me a total feeling of nostalgia. You’re On Your Own Kid was next, including the line “Make the friendship bracelets, take the moment and taste it,” which caused one of the large pop culture moments within the Eras tour, the trading of friendship bracelets. 

The end credits of the movie continued this friendship bracelet motif as a “Thank You” to the fans was posted on the screen, spelled out onto a friendship bracelet. Swift taking hold and making these things that fans connect with creates just an amazing atmosphere within the community, and while the movie was amazing, my favorite part about my viewing had to be the feeling of excitement and overall connection everyone had. 

As I looked around the theater, I saw many people young and old singing along to the songs, holding hands, and copying Taylor’s dance moves. I saw little girls proudly singing The Man’s empowering lyrics, and older ladies giggling as Taylor would swear in her songs. Overall, The Eras tour movie expressed how Swift has created such a safe place for all of these strangers to dance around and be themselves, easily making it one of the best movie-viewing experiences I have ever had.