Sadly, a missed opportunity

Rating: 5/10 (30 November 2019)

Well, who am I to say it. My only perception of Freddie is a someone knowing him only from watching him on TV. A bandmate like Brian May really has authority on that. A Brain was completely happy with Malik portrayal. Yet, watching Rhapsody with Malik, I could not shake the feeling that was not Freddie. Maybe, to Brian, who knew Mercury up close and personal, Malik marvelously channelled Mercury and hit the mark perfectly and captured Mercury's essence as a whole person. But for me, as only a "tv fan", that was not even close enough. Malik did not capture theatrical over the top flamboyance. His portrayal was of a guy with mannerisms of 3rd world immigrant making it big in a show biz. Meh...
I think May is being a bit disingenuous in his praise. I get it, Brain and Roger did get exactly the movie they wanted. And Queen fans will be moved just due to the fact how emotional everyone feels about story behind Queen and Mercury's untimely death. But movie missed huge opportunity to explore why contemporary critics hated Queen so much. What Queen represented to them - decadent, pointless theatrics, totally uninterested in politics, a music for bourgeois disguised as rock&roll. What drove critics even more mad was Queen's unwillingness to pick a "cause" while they could have been such a great poster child for gay pride movement. Great music just for pleasure and good time is just plain wrong. Also, movie actually felt very neutered and borderline boring. The very thing Mercury would cast away. The storyline about bad influence and being manipulated was somewhat baffling and definitely given significant film time at expense of other more interesting and unknown aspects of Mercury life story.