Michael

It’s been discussed plenty of times before the two distinct types of music biopic.

What everyone really wants to see is the ‘warts n’ all’ portrayal of every facet to an artist’s personality. In most cases, it’s what makes the story interesting and worthy of the form.

Then, of course, we have the ‘play to the nosebleeds’ family friendly, very often hugely influenced by the artist themselves (or their estate) types. The flashy, jukebox musical, money makers.

Cue Michael, the biopic of Michael Jackson that, frankly, is hard to believe has actually been released.

Make no mistake, there must have been talk of making a MJ film for a long time. The music, the mystique and the hugely divisive controversy.

Whilst a film depicting those particular controversies was always unlikely, it seemed equally unlikely that we’d get a film just merely depicting his musical life. Surely that would just be too distasteful?

Yes, there’s the hugely successful stage musical Thriller, but that’s more of a celebration of music and dance rather than any sort of story.

But, lo and behold, here is an all singing and all dancing film practically anointing the man as a messianic and titanic musical presence free of any criticism.

Whilst no doubt that’s true in the eyes of some (and there’s no debating the music) it leaves a rather large elephant in the room.

Unless you’ve been frozen in time since 1988, the film ending as Jackson belts Bad at Wembley in a brilliantly realistic sequence akin to Bohemian Rhapsody’s Live Aid scene, it’s hard not to leave the film with a bit of a queasy taste in the mouth.

Let’s talk about the actual ‘film’.

Firstly, this looks and sounds lovely. All of the music is here and, of course, it absolutely slaps. Whilst the writing sequences could perhaps have been longer, the performances are immaculate and the dancing and singing (although potentially meddled with) is on point.

The performances are also excellent. Juliano Valdi in particular as the young Michael and Jaafar Jackson are both magnetic and Colman Domingo is particularly scene stealing as father Joe.

The structure is strictly ‘biopic-by-numbers’ but I’m sure no one expected anything else.

It’s overlong but the attention to detail is particularly strong. The Thriller video sequence is brilliant.

Portrayals of Quincy Jones and Berry Gordy are here but conspicuous by their absence are Janet Jackson, Eddie Van Halen, Paul McCartney and any other musician. Some are named but none are seen and surely that’s because many didn’t want to be associated.

Likewise, with the exception of Joe, everyone in Michael’s circle is depicted as merely subservient to the man’s brilliance with hardly a paragraph of script between them.

It just can’t escape the whiff, nay stench, of meddling behind the scenes to merely construct a shiny but shallow monument to an unfortunately tarnished legacy and clearly solely to make money for the many associated parties behind it.

There’s sadly no escaping the hulking presence of what comes next in this story. Regardless of where you stand, it is simply there waiting like a shadow and causes so many of the scenes here to ring as hollow and, in some case, disturbing.

As incredible as the music is and as lifelike and shiny as the film may be in its performance sequences, this is simply half a story.

Perhaps a shockingly hinted-at sequel could maybe endeavour to tell the whole thing.

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