For many, the summer of 2024 could be described with just a single color: slime green. This was the mark of “Brat” Summer, the lifestyle and fashion cultural movement characterized by Y2K style, boldness, and carefree attitudes. 

The pop star behind this movement is Charli xcx, the stage name for Charlotte Emma Aitchison, a British singer-songwriter and actress who exploded into worldwide fame with her sixth studio album “Brat” in 2024. The hyperpop club album went viral almost immediately, with more than 46 million streams in its opening week, surpassing its expected success by not only being an album, but a movement in pop culture.

After almost two years since this worldwide phenomenon, Aitchison’s new mockumentary film, “The Moment,” ends the chapter of “Brat” Summer.

Instead of commercializing the hit album with a concert documentary, something artists such as Taylor Swift have done, Aitchison has opted for something outside of the box: a snappy mockumentary produced by A24. It examines the music industry under a magnifying glass and does a deep dive into her “Brat” album. 

On Feb. 3, “The Moment” had an advance screening at the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema in Seaport, Mass. followed by a livestreamed Q&A session with Aitchison and director Aidan Zamiri.

The plot of the film follows the character of Charli as she struggles to maintain her own image and artistic integrity while staying on good terms with corporate demands and her concert filmmaker (Alexander Skarsgård) as she prepares for her upcoming arena tour. 

“I’ve definitely experienced times where people, whether that be labels or whoever else, have really tried to mold me and change who I am,” said Aitchison in the Q&A.

The film follows a fictional version of Aitchison — adapted to screen with a personality she describes as “a nightmare”— living in an alternate universe in which she makes different promotional choices that lead the “Brat” album. These decisions, unlike in reality, lead to a large spectacle that makes the most out of the album in regards to money and fame. 

The film covers many topics that may be taboo in the media and music industry, but Aitchison embraces these as the truth of what her career has entailed: cocaine, clubs, drinking, and smoking, which are all prominently featured in the film.

“A lot of our considerations were really about [how] the character of Charli in the film is not the same as the real-world Charli, but it’s also a version of her that could have existed in some different circumstances,” Zamiri said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter. “We wanted to make sure that everything that Charli did felt reasonable in some version of the universe.”

During the filming process, two cameras were always going at once to give the actors the “freedom and looseness to perform how they wanted,” Zamiri said during the Q&A. Whatever rhythm felt good in the moment — no pun intended — was what they would run with. “We had footage that almost felt like we captured a documentary,” he added.

Being in the industry since she was 15, the film captures the experiences of growing up with the many voices that influenced Aitchison’s career and, at times, pushed her to be something she was not. 

This pressure she experienced surfaces toward the end of the film during a conversation between Aitchison’s character and her fictional best friend, Celeste (Hailey Gates). “It didn’t even matter if I liked it. I didn’t think about that,” she says in the film.

She began her music career in 2008 by sharing songs on Myspace, a social networking site, then later became involved in London’s rave scene. In 2010, she signed with Asylum Records, releasing her first song titled “Stay Away” in 2012 on her debut EP “You’re the One.” Her big break came when she co-wrote the hit song “I Love It” with pop duo Icona Pop in 2012, and stepped out as a popular solo artist with her single, “Boom Clap,” in 2014.

She continued making music and touring in the following years, albeit having less hits and media attention. Until “Brat.” Shifting away from her recent pop style, she reconnected with her rave background and focused on a club style underground sound for the album.

The songs from “Brat” went viral on TikTok, with users creating dances to them. The brand even reached as far as to aid Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign when she tweeted in 2024, “kamala is brat.”

It got to the point where Aitchison knew the era had to come to an end before it enveloped her entire career. “We always knew we had to kill it anyways,” she says to Celeste in the same scene.

This internal turmoil carries over in the real world, with Aitchison admitting that she feels it’s time for a rebrand.

“Right now, unlike the me in the film, I am sort of wanting ‘Brat’ to stop and actually pivot as far away from it as possible,” she said at Sundance. 

“The Moment” is this transition. Her career will continue with a lineup of films after beginning to take her acting career seriously in 2025. She will appear in multiple upcoming films following “The Moment,” and her music is also being featured in director Emerald Fennell’s “‘Wuthering Heights’” adaptation starring Jacob Elordi and Margot Robbie.

“This was the end of ‘Brat.’ This is it,” said Boston resident Sergio Muñoz Leiva at the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, donning his bright green “Brat” hoodie from the 2024 “Brat” tour. “It’s her goodbye to ‘Brat,’ and it’s also goodbye for us.”

But this goodbye is not one that neglects the true impact of “Brat,” in both culture and Aitchison’s own career. It carries the weight of having to let go of an identity to move forward and create art that feels authentic. 

 “In this film we use ‘Brat’ and we use Charli’s artistry as a vehicle to express … that we live in a world where, a lot of times, you find your sense of self worth and purpose in something that’s outside of you,”  said Zamiri in the Q&A session. “You put a lot of your sense of self into something that you can’t hold on to, so when that gets taken away from you or you don’t recognize yourself in it, it can be really disorienting.”

Ultimately, the film captures the uneasiness of life’s transitional periods and having to sit in the fear of being misunderstood or judged. 

“I don’t think you have to be an artist to go through that,”  said Aitchison in the Q&A session. “I think that can be something you experience in any job or any relationship in your life.”