Bohemian Rhapsody surrounds the life of Freddie Mercury (Rami Malek) as he first joins the band, Queen, and their rise to fame. Freddie however struggles with connecting to people including his band members because of his flamboyancy and his sexuality. He turns to drugs and later gets diagnosed with AIDS. Now Freddie must get the band back together to do a Live Aid performance at Wembley Stadium that will later go down in history.
What is perfect casting? Rami Maleck as Freddie Mercury. He really gives a great performance in this film and is the highlight for sure. The other band members however didn’t have much to do, and while this film is focused on Freddie Mercury, it would be nice for the other characters to have more depth.
But unfortunately, this biopic feels like every other biopic surrounding a musician that I’ve seen. It’s very paint-by-numbers and formulaic. The musician gets caught up in their stardom, they have tons of sex, do tons of drugs, fight with their band, make up with band mates later, do one last out of this world performance, etc.
This film is also a big controversial because the director, Bryan Singer, has had sexual assault allegations against him. He also got fired off this project and Dexter Fletcher came in to direct, but Singer is still credited as director. But, honestly I can’t tell who directed what.
If you’re a big Queen fan, I would recommend seeing this film. The concert sequences were fun and Malek really excels in this role. As a casual Queen fan myself, I can’t say that this movie did it for me, and if there was a better script, I think this movie could have been great.
I give Bohemian Rhapsody a C-
Spot on, I agree!
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