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Bohemian Rhapsody and Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams

Bohemian Rhapsody and Coldplay Dreams

  
Bohemian Rhapsody   (UK/US https://www.foxmovies.com/movies/bohemian-rhapsody)
         This ode to the British rock band and their legendary lead singer Freddie Mercury had a production as troubled as its star subject, with director Bryan Singer being replaced by Dexter Fletcher (who’s at the helm of Rocketman, a forthcoming biopic on Elton John).  Only Singer gets credited however. Many reviews have been less than kind.  Still, what’s best is how Rami Malek (Mr. Robot) throws himself into the role of the mercurial Mercury, actually born Farrokh Bulsara in 1946 in Zanzibar (now part of Tanzania). Of Indian Parsi descent, he was in his late teens before immigrating to the UK with his conservative Zoroastrian parents. With extra teeth and an exotic look, Mercury went from working as a baggage handler to the top of the charts. The movie glides over that unusual backstory, including an early marriage undone by Mercury’s flamboyant bisexuality. More usual is the slide from meteoric rise into addictions and excess, as well as the tensions leading to the band’s breakup. Where the movie soars is in the creation and performances of Queen’s greatest hits, notably the now-iconic operatic titular track that confounded critics at the time.  This culminates in the band briefly reuniting to perform during the huge 1985 “Live Aid” concert, when Mercury was already suffering from AIDS.  That highpoint also ends the movie which simply notes that he died of complications in 1991.
            Bohemian Rhapsody will be a must-see nostalgia trip for Queen fans. Beyond that, Malek is convincing enough in the audacious lead role to make this compulsive and cautionary tale worth watching. B+
    
Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams  (UK)
  This terrific rockumentary covering several decades of another hugely successful British band had only a one-day global theatrical release on November 14 before going to the streaming platform of Amazon Prime.  I braved Ottawa’s traffic congestion hell to catch the last of two shows at a suburban multiplex and am so glad I saw it on the big screen.
            I’ve been a big fan of the Coldplay foursome (only the Irish foursome U2 rank higher in my estimation) since first hearing about them from some 20-something Brits I travelled with across the Australian Outback in the spring of 2001.  They couldn’t get enough of the first album “Parachutes” and its global hit “Yellow”. The four—lead singer Chris Martin, guitarists Jonny Buckland and Guy Berryman, drummer Will Champion—came from English boarding school backgrounds and shared tudent camaraderie at University College London.  Among many aspiring musicians the four friends created something special that caught on resulting in a stratospheric ascent.  Despite the inevitable downs, and even outs, their at times rocky evolution has formed an enduring bond among the original four and a key manager, also a friend from student days.
            Directing the film is Mat Whitecross, another friend who has followed them from earliest days, resulting in a trove of remarkable close-up archival footage. They were still nobodies in 1998 when the charismatic Martin, still wearing geeky braces, cheekily predicted a band stealing the name “Coldplay” would be “huge”. Then in a few short years that actually happened.  There’s a lot of revealing behind-the-scenes-material, much of the home video variety in grainy black-and-white, contrasting with the pulsing rainbow colour-bursting spectacle of massive soldout stadium shows around the globe, mainly from their most recent 115-show, 18-month “Head Full of Dreams” world tour, starting and ending in Buenos Aires.
            The film to its credit does not leave out the rough spots of “depression, addiction, divorce”, or the hostile reviews from some critics.  The band has had to cope with frontman Martin’s celebrity status and its pitfalls, notably when his marriage to actress Gwyneth Paltrow and their subsequent split became tabloid fodder.  
This is no hagiography and one gets the sense that the four are still pinching themselves at how far they have come without imploding.  They have forged a genuine collaborative friendship that keeps asking what’s next. There’s a disarming candour throughout that belies the outsized “rock star” image.  These guys can critique and poke fun at themselves.  An element underplayed is the band’s social-justice activism (https://www.looktothestars.org/celebrity/coldplay) which is similar if less famous than that of Bono and U2.  That said, Martin does wear his “global citizen” consciousness-raising literally on his sleeve.            
            The mix of thrilling live performance and intimate backstory reminds me of Phil Joanou’s Rattle and Hum made about U2 some 30 years ago which also took its title from a major album tour by a global supergroup that never sounded better.  It’s a compelling combination that makes Coldplay: A Head Full of Dreams one of the best music documentaries of recent years.  A


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