Bohemian Rhapsody

Leonard Maltin reviewed the 1974 Janis Joplin documentary JANIS by stating that it was made in cooperation with her family, "so it ignores her dark side." Much is made in 2018's BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY about Queen members Freddy Mercury, Brian May, Roger Taylor, and John Deacon comprising not only a band, but a family.  Is this why this film is so obviously sanitized? Because the surviving  "family" members didn't want to show all the dirty details, mainly of flamboyant front man Mercury's rather interesting romantic life?  I've read that this project was originally to be directed by Stephen Frears, with a grittier script.  You probably heard that Sacha Baron Cohen was the first choice to play Mercury.  We all know about creative differences.

It's not that I wanted a pornographic wallow in Freddy Mercury's offstage life.  Much of it is well known.  He was bisexual.  His onstage swagger and extroversion was part of the act, suiting the music. The singer was reported to be quite shy when not leading his fellow Brits through some of the most beloved rock and glam of the '70s and '80s.  BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY attempts to package these elements in a more (almost) family friendly movie, one to which grandma and two generations behind her can likewise smile and maybe pump a fist.  I guess I'm OK with that.  Maybe some things are best left to the imagination.  If a film about Queen could just get the atmosphere and music right, it would be enough.

Well.

I wonder how much research screenwriter Anthony (DARKEST HOUR) McCarten really did.  He collaborated with the band members and their manager.  Movies recounting true events change chronology and facts all the time.  Why this happens is usually to heighten dramatic tension, or to milk every potential tear.  Freddie did not tell his band mates that he had AIDS a week before they played Live Aid, but it makes good drama.  Brian May and company laud this film, and don't seem to mind the changes.  Normally, neither would I.

But I find it hard to believe they don't mind that the film places the creation of "We Will Rock You" three years after it was really recorded.  1980, well into the year that the band was moving into a funkier direction.  It makes no sense.  Like no one cared.  This sort of inaccuracy and blase attitude affects the entire production.  The film makes little of Queen's musical dynamics through the years, rather just somewhat ineffectually documenting recreations of recording sessions, including that of the title song.  Bryan Singer's direction of this and all the domestic and studio drama is perfunctory at best.  Dexter Fletcher replaced Singer very late in the shoot and I suppose also bares some of the blame.

BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY rushes through the stages of Freddy's days with the band, only briefly glimpsing his wild parties and leather lifestyle.  What is there has brought charges of homophobia from some.  My main issue is how by the numbers this biopic is.  We know that many people's lives play like bad TV bios anyway, but to mount a press conference scene with the band as this film does - rabid reporters only interested in Mercury's sex life while the singer hallucinates and sees them through some sort of prism of weariness and intoxication - is straight out of some lazy textbook for stories about famous musicians.  There's even a contrived break up of the band that never really happened!

But listen, I really enjoyed this movie nevertheless.  It is quite entertaining and the concert sequences, particularly the highly impressive recreation of Live Aid at the film's close, are excellent.  Lucy Boynton, who plays Mary, Mercury's "love of my life" is also fine and her scenes with Rami Malek, quite good as Freddy, have emotional weight.  Ben Hardy (Roger) and Joe Mazzello (Roger) do well and damned if Gwiym Lee doesn't both look and act exactly like a young Brian May.  It's uncanny.

But it's hard not to chuckle when Mercury prances around the EMI offices, damning formulaic music in such a formulaic movie.