Film Review: Bohemian Rhapsody

{Warning! This post mixed metaphors}

If you’ve studied art, you probably know that Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d'Avignon is considered a masterpiece. Influential, controversial, compelling in its savagery. The profound impact of its revolutionary subject matter, composition and mixed artistic styles the stuff of a thousand textbooks. Sitting in a dark auditorium, a million college students have studied its feral beauty and lasting significance. So naturally, it hangs above the mantle in the majority of homes worldwide. Right?

Of course, no… that honor goes to Van Gogh’s Cafe Terrace at Night. And what, you must be asking yourself, does all this have to do with Bohemian Rhapsody (Singer 2018)? Well, I’ll tell you…

Consumers of art don’t always want the controversial masterpiece, no matter how truthful and honest. Sometimes they just want what is easy on the eyes and not-too-challenging, art that feels good and doesn’t demand too much of us. And so… Bohemian Rhapsody. The whimsical, pretty, uncontroversial ‘cafe under the stars’ version of Queen’s ascendency from rock group to legend.

Put another way, this is the vanilla milkshake of rock biopics.

Bohemian Rhapsody is flawed, yes — but it is also tremendous fun. As bland as it is banal; the ebullient concert sequences go down as easily as a Friendly Fribble. The infectious enthusiasm of the concert sequences — the crowd a CGI, artful mass of adoring whiteness, effectively lifts movie viewers, and are the film’s best scenes. In between resembles something a lot like a MTV Behind the Music episode. The irony that a band as complex and pioneering as Queen, was depicted within such conventional, safe parameters — frankly, knocks me down.

But… Rami Malek’s inspired performance — yowzah! His embodiment of Freddie Mercury (bad wigs and prosthetic teeth aside) is a thing of beauty. His physicality goes a long way to elevate and energize this overly simplistic, overly sentimental account above the schmaltz and mawkishness. An Oscar nod would not be a surprise, he was wondrous. He was mesmerizing, he was enthralling. A sinewy, discordant stunt-double of a showman.

OK, back to the craptastic — and this one resonates: when screenwriter Anthony McCarten decided to make Paul Prenter, Freddie’s manager and homosexual love interest the film’s arch villain, he (perhaps unintentionally?) supported a long and ugly bias against LBGTQ characters on film. Seriously, in a film about Queen? For all it’s rousing nostalgia and feel-good fun, the safeness of this film ultimately betrays Queen and their avant garde, genre-defying legacy.

But as the ending credits scrolled, and warmed by the Hollywood-honeyed wistful glow, you can’t help but remember just how miraculous they were. How collaborative, how improbable — and for all its failings, I was glad I saw Bohemian Rhapsody. And that’s OK. At a time like this when so much of the news is bad, when our democracy is under siege — that’s better than OK.

And besides, I really like vanilla milkshakes.