Citizen Bowie

Rating: 6/10 (10 September 2018)

As flamboyant and glittery as its glam rock subject, "Velvet Goldmine" mines the words of Oscar Wilde, the structure of Orson Welles's "Citizen Kane" and the dystopian vision of George Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four," but is ultimately superficial, satisfied with its own supposed mystique, but then, I guess, so was glam rock.
Like "Citizen Kane" (1941), it's a thinly-veiled and fictionalized sidelong-glance biopic--in this case, of David Bowie--from the perspective of interviews conducted by a journalist. In part, these interviews are even staged like those in the 1941 film, and the investigative story begins with a film being screened, like the newsreel of Charles Foster Kane, except with the film itself burning up at the end. I guess its Rosebud is the entire glam rock scene, although the supposed mystery involves the alleged mainstream selling out by the Bowie-esque figure, Brian Slade, in the Reagan era--here named that of an unseen President Reynolds. Specifically, in the year 1984, alluding to Orwell, and Slade's transformation is represented by a name change and plastic surgery, which is a secret conspiracy for no apparent reason.
In addition to "Kane," the journalist provides his own memories as a fan of the rock stars and his own history of homosexual activity. On top of that, there are UFO sightings in the spirit of glam rock's fascination with science fiction, and an emerald pin that's traced back to Oscar Wilde, with the suggestion that Wilde was an extra-terrestrial, I guess, and a separate female narrator for the introduction. Wilde doesn't really factor into the main narrative, though, except to lend his surname to one character and for the script to sprinkle his epigrams about. For instance, Slade will throw in a line such as "Women defend themselves by attacking, just as they attack by sudden and strange surrenders," from the author's novel, "The Picture of Dorian Gray," which the film directly references in a classroom scene.
The "Dorian Gray" connection is why I finally got around to seeing this, as I was seeking out movie adaptations and reworkings since reading the book. I suppose, I've also been somewhat spoiled recently by having viewed two other rock musicals that recall 19th-century Gothic horror and were themselves box-office bombs that later gathered a cult following: "Phantom of the Paradise" (1974) and "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" (1975). The former, in particular, I consider to be a more integrated and interesting use of Wilde's "Dorian Gray." To my taste, the tunes of those actual 1970s rock musicals, as opposed to this trip down memory lane, were more catchy, too. I think the best songs in "Velvet Goldmine" are the ones that aren't original, and I probably would've liked it more had they received permission to use Bowie's songs. It also surely has a better, or at least more high profile, cast of actors, with the likes of Ewan McGregor, Christian Bale and Toni Collette, but I don't think any of the performances particularly stand out, except for maybe McGregor's flopping American accent... and his other flopping member. That said, this is a visually appealing picture, and the music is effectively used to transition between its scenes of glitz and glamour.