Dark truths Queen movie ignores
If you want to see a film that is largely fictional, with cheesy Spinal Tap moments, and a timeline that is more warped than a vinyl record sitting in the sun, get along to watch Bohemian Rhapsody, the new Queen biopic.
Now, don’t get me wrong, Bohemian Rhapsody, starring Mr Robot’s Rami Malek, is an extremely enjoyable film in that Lifetime Movie way. But those looking for facts would be better served reading one of the many biographies of the band — or skimming their Wikipedia page.
Given the 134-minute run time, it was obviously necessary for the filmmakers to compress events, but many vital elements to lead singer Freddie Mercury’s life story are breezed over, if acknowledged at all. His strained relationship with his parents is never explicitly explained nor properly explored, and his early homosexual feelings glossed over.
There is a lot of assumed knowledge in regards to this area of his life: a flirtation with a girl that focused more on her sartorial style than on her sexual appeal is played largely for laughs, with a wink to the camera.
“You can see where this is leading,” the film seems to imply, and it’s so ham-fisted, we can.
The meet-cute with the rest of the band members, the moment in which Mercury joins Queen after wowing them with his vocal prowess in the carpark of the venue is pure fantasy.
Now, I wasn’t there, but I would bet the farm that Mercury didn’t get rejected because of his teeth, only to immediately belt out one of their songs, compelling the others to chime in with perfect impromptu four-part harmonies.
In truth, Mercury’s appeal to the others was his charisma, rather than his vocal ability. He was a rudimentary vocalist at first, possessing none of his later warmth nor extraordinary range.
The film also fails to acknowledge Queen was his third band, having fronted rock groups since he was 12.
The film seems to have a hard time with Mercury’s sexuality, presenting a confusing and thoroughly PG moment at a truck stop as the flourishing of his active homosexual life, while casting his relationship with a member of the band’s staff as corrupt, a terrible situation that led Mercury astray.
The rest of his homosexual dalliances are treated as mere folly, aside from his 11th-hour love affair with Jim Hutton, which is shoehorned in to give Mercury’s tale a romantic happy ending.
Meanwhile, his lifelong relationship with Mary Austin (who, despite the film’s insistence, was never his wife), was rich with nuance: his animal attraction to her is shown more than once, while he refers to her being a “good shag” during a quite funny family scene.
In contrast, we never see him have sex with a man. We do, however, see him composing a tender love ode to Mary, we also see him rife with jealousy when she dares to carry on with her romantic life many years after they split. Mary was the true love of his life, we are told, and we are never allowed to forget it.
Other elements of Mercury’s sexual life are completely omitted, such his many sexual escapades at legendary New York gay club Mineshift.
Also ignored is that when Aids was rampant in the gay scenes Mercury frequented, he continued with his promiscuity. He told a worried friend: “Darling, f*** it. I’m doing everything with everybody.”
This cavalier attitude extended far. Mercury shared a lover with Gae¨ tan Duga, who was unfairly demonised as “patient zero” in the 80s, falsely accused of bringing HIV to America and spreading it through his promiscuity. Mercury never came out of the closet, and kept his HIV status a secret until just over 24 hours before his death. He never told his parents about his HIV status, nor that he was gay.
In 1994, Hutton said Mercury was in deep denial about his diagnosis, and that once he told Hutton they never discussed it again: “It was his cross and he wanted to carry it the way he chose — without burdening me. If something came up on TV to do with Aids, we’d turn channels.” In turn, when Hutton was diagnosed in 1990, he never told Mercury.
Most troubling, Mercury reportedly continued to have unprotected sex with numerous partners, including Hutton, even after he knew he had HIV. Hutton died of Aids in 2010. This final bell is impossible to un-ring, and hard for fans to reconcile within themselves. No wonder it was left out of the film.
Perhaps this whitewashing had a lot of do with the band’s heavyhanded involvement. Sacha Baron Cohen was slated to play Mercury, but left after reaching an impasse with guitarist Brian May. Cohen wanted a much darker, sexually driven portrayal, while May didn’t want anything to hamper the conglomerate they had built around the band.
After all, in 2018, Queen is less a band and more a brand, cycling through numerous lead vocalists over the years, shilling Queen Monopoly sets and sanctioning a slew of misguided, money-grabbing remixes.
The film’s uneven presentation is also a symptom of being creatively handballed around for years: it was first announced in 2010 with Cohen playing Mercury until he left the film in 2013.
It languished for three years, until Rami Malek signed on in late 2016, with shooting starting in September 2017. By December, director Bryan Singer was booted out after sexual assault allegations. Dexter Fletcher (aka Spike from Press Gang!) completed the film, which was rushed to cinemas. The film’s production was a mess and it shows.
Still, I gotta admit the soundtrack is great.