BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY - a film review
After
watching Bohemian Rhapsody, evidently, it was hard for Queen fans
to leave the movie theatre without shedding a tear or two.
The movie may
very well win the ‘movie of the year award’ going by the production
extravaganza, performance and music, recreating the magic of Queen. No doubt,
the story of Freddie Mercury, a musical genius of the Rock 'n Roll era,
has always enchanted his fans.
Covering fifteen
years of the rise and then the resurgence of Queen after a short break, the
film is almost a biopic on Freddie Mercury as a musician extraordinaire. With
the band’s electrifying performance at the Live Aid Charity concert in 1985, fighting
hunger in Ethiopia, Queen emerges as the band that remains unparalleled for
ages to come.
Interestingly,
like many rags to riches stories of musicians around the world, Freddie
Mercury, born Farrokh Balsara to a humble Parsee family in Zanzibar, learnt to
play the piano in Mumbai, India, and became one of the most talented rock
singers the world has ever seen. Teased as a Paki in England
and torn between his dreams and his father’s disciplining, Farrokh broke
loose to find a new identity and christened himself ‘Freddie’ to belong in the
world of rock music.
As we find in
the movie, Freddie (Rami Malek), the lead singer of Queen, soon created ripples in the music world along with
legendary guitarist Brian May, (Gwilym Lee), drummer Roger Taylor (Ben Hardy)
and bass guitarist John Deacon (Joe Mazzello). The foursome's togetherness was
as inspiring as their bickering appeared heartbreaking.
With the loving
support of Mary (Lucille Boynton), his wife and best friend, Freddie becomes a star to reckon with to conquer the world. She gives him the
emotional strength Freddie needs and continues to be his muse until he
disappoints her with the complexity of his sexuality and philandering.
But Bohemian
Rhapsody is more than just a biopic. It highlights the force that
changed the face of rock music.
Indeed, while
directing the film, Brian Singer -- who had spent a good number of years with
the rock star – does take some creative liberties that have been pointed out by
critics as ‘inaccuracies’. But the movie certainly doesn’t claim to be just a
documentary chronicling his life with clinical glee.
The greatest
attraction of the movie is its music and the characters played with
extraordinary panache -- especially by Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury.
The actor portrays the rock star as his exact ‘avatar’ on and off stage. He
looks every inch the musician and struts about with enormous confidence on
stage like a peacock, flirting and swaggering like the music icon. Yet he
captures Freddie-the-person’s raw emotions and vulnerability imbued with sadness.
When Freddie
writes the lyrics one night at the piano and then sings --
“I
don’t want to die;
sometimes I wished I wasn’t born at all…”
and then,
“I’ve
got to go…..to leave you all behind”
--it
echoes our own thoughts in some of our dark moments. Some of these
sequences in the movie of the pain Freddie harboured in his heart could haunt
us for a long time to come.
Beautifully
shot by cinematographer Newton Thomas Segal, the movie excels with the moving screenplay by Anthony
McCarten as well. Needless to say, the costume design is flamboyant and
appropriately outlandish in places to create the mystique surrounding the star
and baring his fantasies.
If you are a
rock music buff, Bohemian Rhapsody -- also a 20th Century Fox
film -- could be a must on your movie list. It captures the iconic rock star’s
struggle with stardom, his sexual exploits and drug abuse that led to the loss
of friends and family from a point of no return.
Dola Dutta Roy
© Copyright
December 2018
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