Many of these sorts of stories are good enough in actuality, however it takes a very good storyteller to make it entertaining. A writer, director, composer can take something ordinary or even interesting and make it better for a larger audience. Even the best historic novels or movies need to edit and organize the theme and timelines to make the artwork flow. I watched a few interviews with some of the cast members and they mentioned lots more scenes that were shot but cut out of the final version. Saying the first cut was almost 4 1/2 hours instead of 2:15 (which by the way zooms by fast). I think the pace and storyline worked quite well. Did you see the Big Short? In a million years I wouldn't have thought a writer/filmmaker could make the sub montage fiasco and depression into a very funnily tragic and entertaining movie. But they did. Of course they played with the timeline and even though it was historically curate, they added some characters and scenes to further the dramatic effect. Yup Hollywood film making, but foreign and Indie films do this just as often
I thought the timing of his Aids diagnosis worked perfectly around the Live Aid show for this presentation. It was the perfect ending. We didn't need to see him in bed, agonizing and dying of Aids. Obviously if a Beatles movie showed Lennon being shot the day after the Apple Rooftop concert, that's a totally different thing. A very different sort of tragic event.
Yep. And movies, not unlike songwriting and recording, needs to follow a certain amount of “tried and true” to work well. And yes, this movie IS a bit formulaic at times. But probably for the better, for the most part. Movies pretty much HAVE to have some sort of climatic event. With this story, they decided that the climax should be the Live Aid concert. But is that enough? Well, probably not, so let’s make it a bit more “triumphant”. Have the AIDS announcement come before it. Show Freddie maybe a bit more ill then he might have been. Show him making up with his dad. Show him having found true love and Jim and Mary getting along fine. Play up the band rift so the gig is a more of a “comeback”. All of these add up to the best climax possible and all of them are probably true to some degree or another, so we’re not making anything UP here. Just making for a better movie. Or. We could show things EXACTLY how they happened, which is much more dull and anti-climatic and now NOBODY goes to see the movie, nobody new learns ANYTHING about Queen, and everybody involved loses a ton of money and has a negative mark on their careers. But at least we’d see Fat Bottomed Girls played in 1978!!
Also, it's incredibly easy to find the exact timeline of the band. Anybody who wants to learn more about it can just go to Wikipedia or any big Queen fan site. Or they can hang out here.
Ultimately, the filmmakers nailed the spirit of Freddie Mercury and Queen during the 70s and mid 80s. To me, that makes it successful, even though every scene isn't timestamped to the exact time and date.
These points come as news to literally no one. We're all aware that Hollywood takes extreme liberties in order to serve a narrative. However, we are on a music forum, and the 60s-90s rock era was somewhat defined by the musical evolution of its most popular bands. I'm not trying to keep this conversation going longer than necessary, but please bear in mind that this is the only point people are trying to make. If I watched a biopic about Metallica, I would find it bizarre if they busted "Sad But True" out while touring behind "Master of Puppets". If I watched a movie about Nirvana, I would think it equally strange if they played "Heart Shaped Box" while supporting "Bleach". Along similar lines, Queen's earlier albums retain a somewhat more aggressive edge, if I recall, and the band began incorporating a broader variety of influences as they progressed. From that perspective, they evolved, or changed, and the songs would indicate as much, and that's theoretically integral to their story, presuming the film decides to take that route in the first place. Speaking personally, it's not a dealbreaker that the movie has the band performing a song from 1978 in 1974, or writing one of their most iconic songs years after it was released, but from a "rock history" perspective, it does seem like a strange choice. If it serves the film and has the band's blessing (or, as you suggested, the movie captures the "spirit" of the band), so be it, and you may be right that this is something only older or more emphatic music fans will notice. Ultimately, I would only use it against the film if I thought the film itself was too weak and watered down to be anything other than a generic-grade, formula-driven exercise in modern cliches.
It's not at all uncommon for movies to start out MUCH longer and then be cut down. Yes, the 2:15 flies by. And that's the sign of a well-edited, well-constructed movie and storyline. Sure, a lot of other stuff could have been added but now not only is the movie 2:45, but it's probably a 2:45 that drags instead of flies by. I would not be at all surprised to find out that they had written, and maybe even filmed, a scene where "We Will Rock You" is written in 1978 and another where "Another One Bites the Dust" is written in 1980. But then it was decided that the movie just didn't work with those two scenes but, believing that both events are essential to the movie and not wanting to cut either out, came up with a new sequence where they are written at pretty much the same time and now everything flows much better. Yes, some of the hardcore fans will be a bit annoyed but at least the rest of the world won't be bored to tears.
I just finally saw trailer for a film called Overlord. That was the codename for D-Day. I saw the poster and I was really excited. Spielberg did a really good job with Saving Private Ryan, but the invasion was only a small part of that film. I thought "Wonderful! Someone's making a film about Operation Overlord!" I finally saw a trailer. Yeah, it's set during D-Day, but it's actually about an advance group who discover Nazi werewolves or zombies or some such crap. Hey, it could be really great. But if Hollywood doesn't consider D freaking Day exciting enough on its own, what makes you think that they would care about getting when a particular Queen song was released perfectly accurate? "Thirteen thousand aircraft. Five thousand ships. More than ten thousand men killed. Can you punch it up a bit? I dunno, maybe werewolves?"
I would say this is more about trying to find a fresh way to make a horror film than it is about Hollywood not thinking D-Day is exciting enough...
I wouldn't mind so much except that there's a wonderful story related to D-Day that has to be told, about a double agent, 27 completely fictional spies, and managing to fool the Nazis into thinking that Normandy was a diversion using all sorts of stuff including inflatable rubber tanks.
I’m one who searches out more historical info about a person or subject after seeing a dramatic interpretation like this. Any way folks can be introduced to new things is fine by me. Maybe then they’ll check out the real deal.
It sounds like the same sort of gambit as From Dusk Till Dawn, where the movie is a "realistic" thriller for half the running time and then makes an unexpected (if you knew nothing about it) swerve into the bizarre in the second half.
Interesting to learn that the first cut was so long. I probably would have enjoyed that movie more, even though I don’t really care for much that Queen recorded after A Day At The Races. My wife, on the other hand, is a huge fan of Queen and Freddie Mercury, although not the kind of music obsessive to notice the chronological errors with Fat Bottomed Girls and other incidents that I did notice in the theatre, and she loved the movie. The theatre was packed when we saw it, and most of the casual music fans I’ve talked to have loved it as well, so I’d say that the filmmakers succeeded in appealing to general audience, even if they played fast and loose with some of the chronology and skipped over big chunks of the band’s career as if they never happened.
I quite often go to "based on a true story" movies on people and topics I know nothing about, and enjoy them... and then I read the Wikipedia page or whatever afterwards, and I do feel a little disappointed that what I saw was 25 or 50 or 75% fiction. But, the movies work while I'm watching them thanks to my ignorance. The more you know about any subject, the harder it is to watch a movie about it because they're never going to get everything right... and they pretty much count on most people not knowing the difference.
You're complaining about a scene that doesn't really exist, however. IF this had been a scene that was depicting a particular tour and the songs being performed during it and all the visuals were there to represent it --- as we see at the end of the movie with the Live Aid concert -- then yes, which songs are being played would be important. But this is not a scene that exists to show how they began incorporating a broader variety of influences as they progressed, or to show how they had a much more aggressive edge earlier on. This scene is not a "rock history" lesson. And out of the probably 3 minute sequence they are shown on stage playing the song for maybe an entire 15 seconds? But again, it seems you haven't yet seen the movie. So arguing about whether such things are good or bad with someone who hasn't seen it is a bit pointless. Or at least rather frustrating. But I would imagine the conversation in the writing room went something like this: "OK, so we've just finished the scene where it is announced the band is going on their first tour of America. What comes next?" "Well, that seems pretty obvious, don't you think? We need one of those rather cliché scenes that runs about 2 1/2 - 3 minutes that shows a lot of quickly-edited clips of the band on the road--playing gigs, partying in hotels, running around having fun, we see the gigs getting bigger and bigger and the crowds more responsive, etc. One of those where nothing is said, we just have one of their songs playing loudly in the foreground." "Yep. Kinda cliché, true. But those scenes DO work. And we are just far enough along in the movie where we need a little break in the pacing and dialogue to change things up and keep the audience engaged." "Yes. But what song should we use?" "well, you know which one would be perfect for such a scene, don't you? Fat Bottomed Girls! It's got the right tempo and beat and energy and the lyrics are pretty much just about nothing but screwing girls on the road!" "Yes, it WOULD be perfect, but only one problem. This tour is from around 1974. That song didn't come out until 4 years and a few albums later!" "hmmm...good point...so what do we do?" Seems to me our intrepid movie producers only have 3 options: 1) Choose another song from an earlier album. 2) Move the scene to 1978 except now the band is already one of the biggest bands in the world and playing stadiums. So now it's a whole different scene that no longer tells the "first tour of America and watch the band grow in popularity" story. 3) Use FBG anyway because it's the right song for the scene in every other way. Including that doesn't even include any of the broader variety of influences they began incorporating. It's pretty much a straight ahead rocker that really wouldn't have been out of place on the earlier albums anyway. Which choice would YOU have made?
I later told my wife the story about how Brian built his Red Special with his dad from an old fireplace mantel and how that guitar was so essential to his signature tone. Which even she recognized. She exclaimed "now THAT should have been in the movie!". But you can't tell everything in 2 hours and 15 minutes. And it really is more about Freddie than Queen. So you start doing backstory on everyone in the band and now the thing goes on forever!
Maybe the DVD will include the original 4 1/2 hour cut. I enjoyed the movie enough that I would watch that. One problem they had to deal with, I think, was that the re-enactment of Live Aid at the end took away 25 minutes that could have been spent on narrative or stories like the one just mentioned.
Yeah sure. The transition from Ogre Battle to Fat Bottom Girls would have been seemless. You’re really hung up on this song. One of their absolute worst IMO, and sounds nothing like anything from the first three albums.
They shot the entire Live Aid performance on the very first day of production. How wild is that? They shot all the songs, the entire 22 minute performance but left two of the songs out of the film, one of which had been used earlier in a different time and scene in the movie. Im sure a lot of this will be on the Blu-Rey but probably as outtakes and not cut in.
... and the other was marred by feedback. and they would have been faced with a choice of including the feedback and really annoying the whole audience or pleasing the purists.
The argument isn't lazy and it has nothing to do with any part of the story being not good enough. You're too caught up with being disappointed by your own expectations. This is how filmmakers and screenwriters approach films of this nature. It's all part of the craft of filmmaking and the goals/intentions of the producer and director. The type of crowd pleasing film they wanted to make is obvious and from all estimates they were very successful. I really liked the movie the first time and having shed any preconceived notions I'll bet I love it the next time I see it. It's fine if you don't like the movie or screen adaptation but it wasn't lazy, it was intentional.
