“Bohemian Rhapsody” (2018) – A Hypocritical Rhapsody Riddled with Cliches
As passionate and emotional as this film may be, “Bohemian Rhapsody” (2018) is just another boring biopic. The film tells the story of Freddie Mercury and Queen’s rise to fame, chronicling the rags-to-riches story. It delves into Mercury’s sexuality and the tumultuous relationship he shared with his band mates. And it tells it loudly. Very loudly.
From a technical perspective, this film is very competent. The editing is clean, the cinematography looks good, and the sound design is adequate. The acting is also great. Ramki Malek does an excellent job portraying the flamboyant Mercury. The supporting cast give perfectly fine performances.
In terms of character development, the film is as basic as can be. Each supporting character can be categorised two ways: people who oppose Freddie Mercury’s flamboyant personality, and those who exploit it for personal gain. An example of the former would be his band mates, who disband after becoming fed up with Mercury’s arrogance. An example of the latter would be Mercury’s personal manager, Paul, who acts very possessively towards him. As a result, one of the many conversations that occur would go something like this:
Bandmates: “We’re sick of your act Freddie! You’re arrogant and selfish.”
Followed by:
Paul: “Don’t listen to them Freddie. Continue acting egotistical and narcissistic.”
As you might imagine, Paul is made out to be the antagonist. And after viewing the film, I can assure you that he is jaw-clenchingly despicable. It begs the question, “Why?” Why bother making him so infuriating? Because the film needs a second-act low point. In this case, it’s when Mercury, spurred on by Paul’s encouragement, acts like an egotistical jerk until the band breaks up, only for Mercury to realise that he’s been awful, and then apologise to his band mates. The film is riddled with these insipid feel-good moments.
The worst part is that such an event never happened. Queen officially disbanded in 2009, with no animosity whatsoever. Thus, the only reason why the film decided to take this route was to have a classic, formulaic drama where the main characters split up, make up, and then play their hearts out for one last moment.
Furthermore, throughout the movie, Queen is seen as an anti-formulaic band. Their is even a scene where a manager (not Paul) and the band argue over whether to use a different style on their fourth album. In it, the band claim that they are anti-formulaic, they are oh-so unique, they are changing the industry, blah blah blah.
And that’s why this film is so aggravating.
It pretends to be such a unique, emotional roller coaster. It pretends to be similar to the titular song in that they both share one quality: non-formulaic. When in reality, the movie is everything that the titular song is not: a cliche-ridden waste of time.
But it’s even worse.
The film preached non-conformity and uniqueness. Yet it goes so far as inaccurately portray the real-life events (which is not in itself a crime, as long as the film uses such historical inaccuracies to better the movie; see “Rush” (2013) for an example) just for the sake of destroying any uniqueness and conforming to the classic drama formula.
