Rhapsody’s a special kind of magic

Bohemian Rhapsody (M, 134 mins) Directed by Bryan Singer and Dexter Fletcher Reviewed by There’s a couple of ways this review can go. I could start with a very long list of the absolute nonsense in the Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody.

Writer – and Taranaki’s own – Anthony McCarten has a fine gift for taking outrageously interesting and complex lives and events and bolting them to a bog-standard three-act structure, deleting anything that doesn’t fit into a predictable narrative arc and making up a bunch of events that never happened to get the film to its predetermined conclusion.

In The Theory of Everything and Darkest Hour, his victims were Stephen Hawking and Winston Churchill. Have a quick Google of ‘‘historical inaccuracy’’ on either of those films and read with jaw agape at how far McCarten is prepared to depart from the truth, just to tell us a yarn.

I guess McCarten’s retort would be: ‘‘if you want to see a documentary, go rent one’’, because the multi-millions it takes to make a feature film on the scale of Bohemian Rhapsody aren’t about to be unlocked for some moist-eyed rendition of ‘‘the facts’’.

And he would have a point. But – just to give you an idea of the scale of deceit here – you should at least know that Freddie Mercury was diagnosed with HIV two years after Live Aid, not the week before.

And frankly, when the biggest hankie-grabbing moment in an allegedly ‘‘true story’’ is built on a total fabrication, then I reckon we have a problem.

So, let’s just move on in the knowledge that Bohemian Rhapsody is a film ‘‘inspired by’’ the facts, but which often flat-out lies to our faces if someone figured it would make a better story. And, as that film, although I am kind of loath to admit it, Bohemian Rhapsody is an absolute goddamn blast.

I see a lot of films and, outside of festival screenings and premieres, I’ve only seen a film get a sustained round of applause from a paying audience a handful of times in my life. But the Embassy Theatre in Wellington erupted with clapping and cheering as the credits rolled. And quite right, too.

We had just been present at a note and step-perfect recreation of Freddie and Queen’s allconquering resurrection at Wembley Stadium, in front of the global Live Aid audience of an estimated billion people.

Director Bryan Singer (he was fired during the filming, but the Live Aid-sequence is his) is a maniac for detail. What Singer and his cast and crew achieve in the last 20 minutes of Bohemian Rhapsody is a cinematic miracle. It literally is ‘‘being there’’, but with a better sound system.

The two hours or so that get us to that thunderous final flourish are not always successful and too often the contrivances of the script are far too visible to anyone who ever wonders why famous people so often have lives that conform so exactly to the ludicrous and – literally – inhuman demands and constraints studios still impose on scriptwriters.

But, the film works. And I reckon that’s down – mostly – to the astonishing performance by Rami Malek as Mercury. I doubt anyone reading this who watched Malek’s work as a troubled and introverted loner in Mr Robot thought to themselves, ‘‘by Hokey, that young fulla would make a great Freddie Mercury’’, and that is why you and I are not working as casting directors.

What Malek does here is wonderful. Despite the welding marks all over the storytelling, Malek absolutely owns this film.

He is in every scene, very nearly every shot, and never for one second do we question the authenticity of his portrayal. And considering the unique and instantly recognisable man he is playing, that really is an incredible achievement.

Around Malek, a very credible cast – including Mike Myers, playing an invented character just for the purpose of delivering one good punchline – all fill out the support roles very well.

Gwilym Lee (The Tourist )is spookily good as Queen guitarist Brian May.

Bohemian Rhapsody is an often irritating and occasionally unforgivable film. But it is also one hell of a good night out.

Rami Malek gives an astonishing performance as Freddie Mercury.