A common thing I hear is to compare this film Rocketman  to last year’s movie Bohemian Rhapsody. Both movies explore the history of well know rock performers from the 1970s and 1980 but truly I do not think that these films are really all that similar. Bohemian Rhapsody   is a much more standard example of a biographical narrative film such as I Saw The Light  Hank Williams or Sweet Dreams  with Patsy Cline. In all three movies well respected actors take on the roles of iconic musical legends, either perform or lip synch some of their most famous songs while recreating those musicians musical performances this is not what happens with here.

Rocketman is a biopic exploring the life of rock icon Elton John but this movie is a full on musical using the best-known song from John’s catalog as their vehicle into his life. There are a few examples in the movie of ‘here’s Elton John performing at this famous venue’ but unlike the other films I have mentions these performances are the exception and not the form of Rocket Man. With little regard to the chronology this film has the characters bursting into these famous tunes as a method of exploring the emotional inner lives and this is not limited to Elton, but rather to a wide swath of the cast.  If you go hoping to find the source of the inspiration to songs such as Saturday Night’s Alright,  or Your Song, then you will be disappointed. This is much closer to a movie such as The Sound of Musicthan Bohemian Rhapsody.

t is very meta but also a wonderful tool using the music of Elton John to explore what it felt like to be Elton John. Taron Egerton plays adult Elton john and his performance is one that gut punched me. There are moments where with a single expression Taron fully involved me in Elton’s pain and torment as he struggled with his life, his music, and his identity. His acting is open, accessible, and raw, a very far cry from the performance I witnessed in Kingsman: The Secret Service. Jamie bell plays Elton’s long time collaborator and lyricist Bernie Taupin and together they give us a rare thing in today’s major motion picture, a deep, very emotional, and very real relationship between two men that isn’t built upon sex. Of course the movie explore Elton’s journey into his sexuality but the core dramatic issue if John’s battles with drugs and alcohol. In addition to using the famous tunes as entry points into the psyche of the characters the film also using the unreality of the medium to give visual poetry to their inner lives. In the trailers you can see people literally floating off the ground as they are lifted by his performance but the fantasy aspect run much deeper than that demonstration but rather the movie often becomes much more interpretive than descriptive and frankly this works much better than a simple linear narrative. When the movie ended I felt as if I had shared in the emotional truth of the character’s life though I doubt I learned anything of an actual factual nature. This is not a documentary with musical interludes but rather emotional exploration via images and music in search of tone, a feeling, which hopes to capture an essence that reflects Elton John. It is well worth seeing.