Wonderful Study of an Ill-Starred Love Affair

Rating: 8/10 (27 June 2013)

BEHIND THE CANDELABRA looks at the man behind the myth of Liberace - entertainer, pianist extraordinaire and promiscuous homosexual. Michael Douglas is just wonderful in the role; he has the voice intonations absolutely right, as well as the body-language. His Liberace is so in love with his self-created myth that he cannot see beyond it; to say that he is massively self-centered is no understatement. At the same time Douglas portrays him as vulnerable; however much of a star he might have been, he needed young men to lean on as well as to take to bed. Matt Damon is equally wonderful as Liberace's much younger lover Scott Thorson; at first rather bemused that the celebrity should take such an interest in him, and then falling hopelessly and yet eternally in love. Steven Soderbergh's film begins quite humorously, with Douglas and Damon indulging in an elaborate courtship; but the tone soon changes as the film examines the lives of the ill-matched yet inseparable couple. The material is sympathetically yet cleverly handled, producing a compelling piece of work.