“Bohemian Rhapsody” Movie Review

Bohemian Rhapsody – Frame the Ticket

The item on today’s setlist is the Freddie Mercury biopic, Bohemian Rhapsody.

This film stars Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury, and, essentially, this movie sets out to tell the story of the band, Queen, but puts most of the focus on the man that was Freddie Mercury.

Though about 2 hours in length, the film moves along very quickly as it starts with Freddie working as a bag runner at an airport and works its way all the way to a grandiose finish at the famous Live Aid concert of 1985. Honestly, though, the pace at which the movie takes place never really bothered me, and, for the most part, the pace was exactly how it needed to be to fit all it does in.

That leads me to the directing and writing of the film. It was wonderful. Almost perfect, in my opinion. The movie is one of the most gorgeous films I’ve ever seen. The writing all felt real. It felt like this is what could have actually happened. It’s what I wish actually happened, even though I know the film was “Hollywood-ized” and things were expedited or left out or changed to fit the story the filmmakers were actually trying to tell. It doesn’t really matter, though, as it’s not a documentary and the directing and acting carries the film to its own special place.

I also love the fact that Bohemian Rhapsody, for the most part, either lets you draw your own conclusions about what is happening or about what did happen in between scenes. To me, I felt like I could fill in any blanks that may have happened between scenes that led the characters to the situation in the scene they were in.

Rami Malek, to me, channelled Freddie Mercury to a tee. His own singing voice sounded so much like the real deal, but maybe they mixed Rami’s voice with the real deal, I don’t know. What I do know is he nailed the mannerisms and the persona that is Freddie Mercury.

No actor in Bohemian Rhapsody stood out as less than the others. There’s even a cameo in a couple scenes from an actor I didn’t know was in this film, and those scenes are some of my favorite and some of the funniest from the movie. I won’t tell you who it is, but you’ll know when you see the movie.

I enjoyed this movie so much, that I can hardly find any fault with it other than this: there are times that I feel they are little heavy handed with certain topics. Rather than just showing what happened and presenting it as a “fact,” the film also decides to add an opinion to try to sway you to one side or the other on these topics. As someone who likes knowing the facts and who enjoys when films allow you to draw your own conclusions, as Bohemian Rhapsody does for a majority of the film, this bothered me.

In the end, however, that drawback isn’t enough to lower my overall opinion of the film. For Bohemian Rhapsody, I will Frame the Ticket.

The best part about this film is that it hinted at, and introduced me to, Queen songs that I had either forgotten about or didn’t even know existed. I also may or may not have jammed out to a Queen playlist the drive home from the theater as well as on my way to record the video version of this review.