TIL Bohemian Rhapsody was formally the highest grossing biopic. I kind of liked the movie but I know a lot of people who obsessed over Freddie Mercury and they all swear the movie is wretched
I found it terrible but I guess I wanted a Freddie biopic and it was a Queen biopic…I think it was way too sanitized and shallow. They recreated the looks, the clothes, the music and performances but I feel like nothing new or insightful was revealed. There was no emotional intimacy like Walk the Line or Rocketman.
I'm super upset Sacha Baron Cohen isn't apart of it. The band came out and he said he wasn't that type of actor that could do it or something. Sacha said it's because they were cleaning up the bio pic too much. Can't argue with the band on profits though.
I just thought a lot of lies were unnecessary. The director said it's just to tighten up the film, but I think a better director could do justice to both.
I really liked Rami Malek in Bohemian Rhapsody, but the movie as a whole honestly felt like a medley of Mercury + Queen, kind of glossing over the story very quickly. Not to say I didn't enjoy it though, and I understand that Queen had a huge say in the direction of the film.
Brian May is Incredibly protective of how Mercury is portrayed, IMO much to the detriment of what the man truly represented and was. Like yes, he was a rock god but he was also a deeply troubled man who struggled with his identity and sexuality for decades much due to the work of people hiding queer icons behind rose-colored glasses as May has done.
Not just Mercury's story. All those times the movie had Mercury spiraling into sex and drugs and the movie versions of May and the rest of the group were cuddling with their wives and girlfriends. You know, the way they were famous for doing.
I found that even at 3 hours long Oppenheimer was one of the most gripping films I've ever seen. Constant tension from not only the ramifications of developing a nuclear bomb, but also the intense and clashing political motives of each of the characters.
What truly annoys me about biopics is that Hollywood makes no attempt these days at these being true to the real-life characters they're portraying. They're 100% fiction using well-known public figures as the source of their verisimilitude. Movies like The Social Network and The Imitation Game, to name just these two, have barely any resemblance to their real-life counterparts. That's also true of Bohemian Rhapsody.
Given that, I don't even understand what's the point of them.
I got the feeling that Oppenheimer is quite true to the events compared to many other Hollywood biopics. I could read Wikipedia about the events after watching the movie and think “oh yeah, that happened in the movie” for many paragraphs. Some lines in the movie are even accurate word for word.
The Imitation Game is pure fiction Abraham Lincoln the Vampire Hunter by comparison. It’s a fascinating story to base a movie on, but they decide to throw it all out and instead replace it with something completely made up. I hate how they wasted that potential.
Agreed wholeheartedly. That said, Oppenheimer is officially the only biopic I've ever watched twice and will definitely watch again someday. Which makes it my favorite biopic, for whatever that is worth about a genre that I loathe.
Strong disagree. Biopics are one of my favorite genres of film (and TV). It's interesting to reflect on how someone else experienced or interpreted events. While a biography/documentary might be more historically accurate I appreciate the more entertaining biopics as they often do a better job of conveying the emotion of their characters.