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Laying on no shortage of director Baz Luhrmann’s famed maximalist approach, Elvis is, in at least some ways, the rip-roaring and even irreverent spectacle the Elvis legend arguably needed. It is a biopic dedicated to dispelling the funerary gloom that has long accompa- nied images of the King since his passing in 1977, and largely succeeds in communicating the energy and subversiveness that Presley stood for in the eyes of a generation of fans in his own time.
Much of that success, of course, can be attributed to the sheer physical and emotional electricity of Austin Butler in the titular role. Embodying an easy androgyny that might initially have you believing you have inadvertently walked into a screening of The Phil Oakey Story, Butler’s Elvis conveys
sufficient rebellious zest, smouldering physicality, playfulness, and vulnerability to convince us of the enormity of the pop-culture phenomenon – and precisely why that was so.
Less sympathy is extended to a moribund and
past-the-times Hank
Snow (the ‘50s country
legend portrayed by David Wenham), and even less in
the case of Tom Hanks’ Colonel
Tom Parker,
Elvis’s
long-time manager,
who takes on
the narration
and framing of the entire tale.
From his deathbed in 1997, the man alternately known as the Dutch-born Andreas Cornelis van Kuijk desperately attempts to
recast the film’s own suggestion that he played a less-than-ethical part in Elvis’s rise and fall. He cannot help being haunted by his own retelling, one of the most memorable moments seeing him insist when presented with an exhausting and ailing Elvis, “the only thing that matters is that that man gets up on that stage tonight.”
Also played upon to great extent is the King’s channel- ling of Black music, Elvis being situated as a joyous recipient and appreciator of the sounds of such influential figures as B. B. King (Kelvin Harrison Jr.), Little Richard (Alton Mason) and Big Mama Thornton (Shonka Dukureh). We certainly come away feeling educated on Elvis’s enchantment with gospel and blues from his youth, even if Luhrmann makes little attempt at a
deeper confrontation with the complexities of how Black art has historically moved through white
spaces.
Along similar lines, other, darker elements of the Elvis mythology are largely sidestepped in
what remains, in the round, a high-octane extravaganza that keeps the drama largely
onstage, rather than off. It is territory in which Luhrmann is comfortable, with the result
being more of a bracing jukebox than a source of greatly piercing insight
into any of the men – or women – behind the King.
3 vinyls out of 5 rating
Gavin Lenaghan
Copywriter
40
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