Bohemian Rhapsody (And a List of the 50 Best Queen Songs)

It's hard for me to hate a film that celebrates some of the greatest music of the past century from start to finish, so hate it I shall not. It should be noted, however, that many people do hate this film, the Freddie Mercury biographical film Bohemian Rhapsody, but it's also a deeply popular film that many have adored, especially those who were around during the Queen years. My mother, for example, has called it one of the greatest films she has ever seen, and one couple has apparently seen it at least 24 times, calling it "two hours of freedom."

I don't share their enthusiasm for Bohemian Rhapsody. I'm not sure why it was nominated for Best Picture (although it would have been more worthy of the win than the winner, Green Book). It won a handful of Oscars last Sunday, and I'm not sure it deserved any of them, to be honest. What to really make of this film?

Rami Malek, most famous before this film for playing the lead role in the television series Mr. Robot, took over playing Queen lead singer Mercury after Sacha Baron Cohen dropped out over creative differences. Malek certainly looks like Mercury, though he also seems a bit too thin. At any rate, he won the Oscar for Best Actor, making him the first Arab-American to do so. I'm not sure I would have picked him for the award. For one, I've grown tired of watching the Academy reward imitation, as they always seem to do. Second, I'm impressed with Malek's ability to convincingly portray the famous singer, but it is Mercury's singing voice they've used, not Malek's, which is distracting. Bradley Cooper provided his own vocals for A Star Is Born, so perhaps he would have been more deserving.

Malek is joined by Ben Hardy as drummer Roger Taylor, Joe Mazzello as bassist John Deacon, and Gwilym Lee as guitarist Brian May (that's Dr. May, now, for he has his PhD in Astrophysics, something the film jokes about). Mercury, Taylor, Deacon, and May. You won't find many bands quite like that, one in which all created different songs. (As a matter of fact, the Beatles are the only other one presently coming to mind.) The four actors do a decent job portraying them, with Lee's voice sounding remarkably similar to May's. Both May and Taylor served as creative consultants for the film, and both appeared with Adam Lambert to open this year's Oscars. Allen Leech, Aiden Gillen, Tom Hollander, and Mike Myers (in lots of makeup) appear in supporting roles.

I think the biggest complaint about this film that everyone can agree on is that it checks all the boxes in the biographical film format. We see how Queen met, we see their rise, we see Mercury become a bit of a drug addict, we see them rise again. It was sort of tolerable when Walk the Line and Ray did it years ago, but after the parody film Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story ripped the formula to shreds, it's remarkable that those involved in making Bohemian Rhapsody didn't consider that many would roll their eyes at a movie employing all these tropes once more.

  

You'll hear a lot of the famous songs and sometimes how they were made. These scenes are generally good fun. Much of the rest of the film, however, is a bit of a bore. There is not much emotional weight here, save for a few moments, but it basically drops them in an instant and moves on to the next bit of action. The highlight of the film is probably the re-creation of the band's highly acclaimed performance at Live Aid in 1985, which everybody has watched or re-watched on YouTube over the past few years. It's the one part of the movie no one can object to. That being said, all they're really doing is re-creating a moment in pop culture history that everyone likes, so it's debatable as to whether or not that's much of an accomplishment.

Much has been written about Mercury's sexuality and how the film portrays it. Even when the very popular trailer was released, people were up in arms over the film's supposed mishandling of the issue. When Malek accepted his Best Actor Oscar, he identified Mercury as a gay man instead of bisexual. I'm not sure I sympathize with their argument. May, in an interview with Terri Gross in 2010, gave what sounds like a clear answer. Gross said we don't know exactly everything about Mercury's sexual orientation, and then May told her that Mercury would often say, "I'm gay as a daffodil, darling." So I don't think this film qualifies as bi-erasure. That being said, if you'd like to read a fair critique of how Bohemian Rhapsody addresses queerness, I recommend reading Jude Dry's article from IndieWire and Taylor Henderson's article from Pride.

Is Bohemian Rhapsody a bad film? I'm not sure I would go there. I would not want to snobbishly lecture so many people who've fallen in love with it. But it's forgettable, and certainly not worthy seeing twice, let alone 24 times.

Best Queen Songs:

50. Made in Heaven
49. Millionaire Waltz
48. Thank God It's Christmas
47. Bring Back That Leroy Brown
46. The Miracle
45. The Prophet's Song
44. I Was Born to Love You
43. Headlong
42. Invisible Men
41. Hammer to Fall
40. Man on the Prowl
39. Melancholy Blues
38. Fight From the Inside
37. Seaside Rendezvous
36. I Want It All
35. Innuendo
34. Sail Away Sweet Sister
33. It's a Beautiful Day
32. Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon
31. Play the Game
30. Death on Two Legs (Dedicated To...)
29. Track 13
28. A Kind of Magic
27. Good Company
26. Teo Torriatte
25. The Loser in the End
24. Save Me
23. It's a Hard Life
22. Now I'm Here
21. In the Lap of the Gods
20. '39
19. Keep Yourself Alive
18. The Show Must Go On
17. Who Wants to Live Forever?
16. Princes of the Universe
15. Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy
14. Somebody to Love
13. Crazy Little Thing Called Love
12. Bicycle Race
11. Don't Stop Me Now
10. You're My Best Friend
9. Killer Queen
8. Radio Ga Ga
7. Fat Bottomed Girls
6. I Want to Break Free
5. We Are the Champions
4. Another One Bites the Dust
3. We Will Rock You
2. Under Pressure
1. Bohemian Rhapsody