Yes No Maybe So: Baz Luhrmann's 'ELVIS'
Thursday, February 17, 2022 at 4:53PM by Nathaniel R
Baz Luhrmann's career began explosively with two of the most endearing, unusual, and entertaining films of the 1990s (Strictly Ballroom and Romeo + Juliet). His promise as a Great Showman was realized with his masterpiece Moulin Rouge! (2001) which was only his third feature. Unfortunately in the 21 years since that very modern movie musical revitalized its genre, he mostly vanished from movie screens. He's made only two features since, the disjointed epic Australia (2008) and a box office hit adaptation of The Great Gatsby (2013). Nearly a full decade later we finally have a sixth feature. His latest, which was untitled long enough that its official title Elvis is hysterically anti-climactic, is a biopic of the rock n roll superstar. The movie hits theaters on June 24th, so let's break the trailer down with our Yes No Maybe So™ system...
YES
• Everything about the clip above is hilarious and perfect and historically authentic and camptacular. Bless Baz for giving Elvis's swiveling hips and crotch their own (multiple) close-ups and, we presume, character arc. "If I can't move, I can't sing"
• Smart to immediately recognize the Black influence on Elvis' music (but did it have to be through childhood flashbacks?) and to incorporate the black experience and the story of integration.
• What's more a lot of Elvis nuts (they're still out there!) are going to the feel the Spirit as emphatically as the crowds in that tent revival if Baz & Austin pull this movie off.
• Austin Butler's voice sounds just right. But then at this point, Elvis has been imitated by so many thousands of people that maybe we wouldn't know the difference if it wasn't?
• Elvis's costumes, on and off stage look amazing. Look at this pink lacy shirt! Catherine Martin (aka Mrs Baz Luhrmann) coming for her fifth Oscar?
• The cast is potentially amazing and filled with Aussie talent -- current Oscar nominee Kodi Smit McPhee, hunky Luke Bracey, Stranger Things breakout Dacre Montgomery, rising actress Olivia DeJonge (as Priscilla Presley) and Baz repertory players Richard Roxburgh and David Wenham. On the American side in addition to Hanks there's Kelvin Harrison Jr, who is briefly glimpsed to deliver that "you're a famous white boy" line.
• We've seen all five Baz pictures and we're not about to stop now. He has been sorely missed. It looks like one of his pictures too (at least in parts): vibrant, musical, and bursting with energy and visual information.
NO
• Why does it sound like Cher singing in the first clip?
• Unfortunately every time our eyes got entranced with the visuals, Tom Hanks was narrating something or other. So distracting! Let Elvis's crotch speak for itself!
• What is going on with the makeup job on Tom Hanks? That is too much. People would not readily know what "Colonel Tom Parker" looked like so why try to recreate it by disfiguring the actor? Why are we even paying these actors their exorbitant salaries (based largely on being belovedly familiar and because audiences want to see them again and again) if they are rendered unrecognizable so we're not actually, you know, seeing them.
Or to put it in a simpler way...
Colin Farrell’s Penguin is also in ELVIS??? Weird but okay pic.twitter.com/qHjZjQ1jdK
— the morally corrupt juan barquin (@woahitsjuanito) February 17, 2022
• Also what is going on with his voice? It's distractingly caricature accenty. It's foolish to judge a performance as great or terrible based solely on trailers (people do it every year only to be proven wrong by reviews and Oscar nominations or the lack thereof) but... we're worried.
• Biopics ALWAYS work best when they work within limited time frames to give you a snapshot of a life or dig deep into a defining moment by zeroing in on it completely. This, sadly, appears to be shaped like the sperm-to-worm variety of biopic complete with childhood scenes and his later puffy, messy years.
MAYBE SO
• We admit to being (mostly) unfamiliar with Austin Butler. We've seen him in a some total of two things and were thoroughly unimpressed with his work on The Shannara Chronicles (though the whole shows wasn't exactly a bastion of fine acting so it was likely the show's problem and not his) but he made for a good menacing sidebar in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood. This is a project and a role big enough to make him a superstar if he has the goods. Signs are promising in this trailer. It withholds him for the first minute and we worried but there are enough glimpses at his performance in the second minute to feel like he could go supernova this summer. Perhaps this should be in the "Yes" column.
• It'll be interesting to see how this fares at the Oscars. The Oscars have been terrible lately (yes even more than before) about admitting that films exist outside of October through December but perhaps they'll notice this? It is a biopic about a musician and that is one of their most well known fetishes.
• What is going on with Mandy Walker's cinematography? It looks vibrant in some places and washed out and colorless in so many others (the bane of current cinema). Is it just that tired trope of flashbacks and memories being in a desaturated color palette?
• The success of this picture is going to hinge on how hard people fall for Austin Butler and how well Baz manages to convey his entire life (but why?!?) while also framing it all through his manager for some reason. It sounds totally unwieldly and if it fails that will all be on Baz. Consider...
Big fan of how Baz Luhrmann has claimed three writing credits on one movie pic.twitter.com/aBc0UhGRYl
— Guy Lodge (@GuyLodge) February 17, 2022
All that said we're an emphatic yes because it's Baz and he's always ambitious. You?
Reader Comments (9)
YES. This looks really good from the small bits a trailer can show. Butler looks like a great fit. The visuals are strong. Kelvin Harrison Jr. is in it...yay! The musical approach is enticing. I am worried about Hanks' accent. It's strange and offputting. We'll have to see how it works in the context of the film. I like this womb to tomb version because Elvis had a fascinating story, and to not tell the whole thing would feel like a cheat. JMO.
NO. I loved Moulin Rouge. But I loathed Gatsby.
LOL if there's even a remote possibility of titling a biopic as the protagonist's first or last name, can't you call it that until a decision is made? The anti-climatic reveal is truly hysterical...name it "Elivis" in production then keep it or change it (hi Soggy Bottom)
Yes for Baz and I can see some of his razzle dazzle here, but this looks very paint-by-numbers. The title isn't helping.
I went straight to YouTube and I think Hanks got it right. He's a very good impersonator.
That screenplay credit seems like it can be part of "No". Seems to signify a messy behind-the-scene production with some rewrites and change-of-hand. But maybe it is more common than I think?
Baz will tell the story boldly, that's for sure. I'm not super optimistic, but definitely intrigued enough to hope to at least be entertained. I feel like Austin Butler will give a good performance, and that's the most important aspect.
I'm a fan of Baz as I do love a lot of his films with Australia being my least favorite as it tried to be a lot of things but never found its footing. I am intrigued by this although I think Butler is a little to lanky to be Elvis in the 60s/70s but I'm willing to give him a chance.
Yet, I am doubtful that it will top the 1979 TV movie by John Carpenter with Kurt Russell in the role as Russell just fucking killed it as the King. Well, he had an unfair advantage because he did a movie with the King in It Happened at the World's Fair as a kid Elvis paid to kick him in the shins.
Looks like Jersey Boys, Yikes.
It's Baz and we get movies from him so rarely, of course it's a yes.
That moment you've giffed is perfect. I agree that the washed out cinematography looks bad, but framing and intent seems right. I think what the trailer shows is that hopefully this will be a movie that SHOWS us why Elvis was a star and so beloved, rather than just telling us. Given it's Baz, that shouldn't be a surprise—a flashy musical number he is surely not one to pass up.