Directed by: Bryan Singer
Starring: Rami Malek, Ben Hardy, Joseph Mazello, Gwilym Lee, Lucy Boynton, Aiden Gillen, Mike Myers, Tom Hollander, Allen Leech
Bohemian Rhapsody is about as flat as Freddie Mercury was energetic. There are fleeting moments in which things perk up, but otherwise Bohemian Rhapsody goes the safe route in depicting the story of Freddie Mercury and those three guys who backed him up. Make no mistake, this is mostly the Freddie Mercury show, and as Queen's most famous member, it should be. With that being said, why make Bohemian Rhapsody if it provides less insight than documentaries which have been made about Mercury and Queen? There isn't much covered here that isn't already part of Queen lore, along with plotlines created thanks to dramatic license, which is par for the course in biopics. In some cases, these changes are for the better. And if you're going to make a movie about one of the most charismatic lead singers in rock history, shouldn't the wattage be turned up? One of Queen's 80's hits was "I Want to Break Free" and we get the impression Bohemian Rhapsody would like to do the same thing. There's a TV movie of the week feel to it.
Bohemian Rhapsody uses Queen's classic July 1985 Live Aid performance as the pinnacle of the band's career and then backtracks from there. Beginning in 1970 London, Farrokh Bulsara, from a conservative Zanzibar family, transforms into flamboyant Freddie Mercury shortly after joining the band who would soon become Queen. He meets a woman named Mary (Boynton). She soon becomes his fiancée, but even if we didn't know what we already know about Freddie, she would soon realize this engagement would never turn into a marriage; partly because Freddie is often on the road, and mostly because he's gay. The fact that he wanted to buy a pair of women's pants on their first date should've been a dead giveaway. One of the unintentionally hilarious pieces of dialogue in the movie occurs when Freddie reveals a secret he has been struggling with: "I think I'm bisexual." Mary replies, "No, Freddie, you're gay,"
Freddie's relationship with Mary was a complex one, but the movie doesn't mine this for all of its dramatic worth. Mary disappears for large stretches, and we never gain the sense of how special their friendship was to each other; so special that Freddie reportedly left his estate to her and only she knows the location of his ashes. As far as Freddie's scenes with his fellow Queen members, they mostly seem to be standing around waiting for Freddie to show up and interact with them. There is little, if any, belief that Roger Taylor, John Deacon, and Brian May have lives of their own. Yes, they are given spouses and there is sparse dialogue referencing their families, but that's about it.
I enjoy scenes in musical biopics when we learn about the making of famous songs. Bohemian Rhapsody is surely one of the most layered, complicated, and groundbreaking songs ever recorded, and sadly the movie shortchanges the difficult process of creating it. When the band plays the song for EMI executive Ray Foster (Myers), Foster utters a line in which the famous head-banging to the song in Wayne's World is slyly alluded to. Negative critical blurbs populate the screen about Bohemian Rhapsody, but soon the song would be regarded as a classic. There are other brief scenes in which the inspirations for songs like "Another One Bites the Dust" and "We Will Rock You" are referenced, but not in any interesting way.
Rami Malek (with prosthetic protruding teeth and all) looks somewhat like Mercury, and his stage performances are convincing enough, but the screenplay doesn't give him much depth or insight. We superficially understand the problems drugs, alcohol, and a voracious sexual appetite played in his eventual demise to AIDS in 1991, but we've seen similar themes in countless other biopics. Malek does what he can to bring Freddie to life, but he is hampered. Bohemian Rhapsody feels like a generic rock star biopic than something which specifically reveals Freddie Mercury to us all. With help of some CGI and cutaway shots, the energy of the Live Aid performances is adequately captured (albeit lip-synced like the rest of the movie's musical performances), but you could cut out the middle man and simply watch the clip of the show on YouTube and gain a greater appreciation.
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