Wife recorded Rocketman and had asked me if I wanted to see it, and I kept saying no. I just didn't think it could be good after watching the Queen movie (Bohemian Rhapsody) and the Beatles lite version (Yesterday), which took advantage of using the Beatles music to make it likable, alhough the movie wasn't too bad. I had been napping from eating so much Easter evening, and woke up intent on writing something for Monday morning, but I could not focus. Wife started watching the movie as I lay in the guest room with her with my earphones on and my laptop on the bed. Once I caught a glimpse of a young Elton running in full on Devil costume, complete with 8 foot wings, I had to see what he was doing. I promptly closed my computer and took off the earphones.
I like the use of flashbacks in movies, you get to see the actor/musician telling their tale from their perspective in a given moment of their life. We catch up with him as he has had a meltdown and accepted that the drugs and the alcohol is too much. We see him at first aggressively introducing himself to the AA group, and slowly as the movie proceeds, he becomes disarmed and starts taking off the devil costume almost as a sign that the evil that has engulfed him is being removed. We see him start at his childhood, playing with the family piano and it seems he has a gift to hear and repeat music by ear. After having to endure an asshole of a father (who at least had a decent music collection for young Elton to listen to behind his back), we see him not being loving at all, even seeming to have a slight disgust for the boy. This becomes a key emotion as the story comes from Elton's perspective, nobody seem so to have love for him. His mom is also a piece of work, constantly telling him how it is his fault his dad left them (yet we see a scene where she is fooling around with another man). I know Elton John is a talent and a treasure, but I had forgotten how many hits were his.
The movie was a tad long, but I didn't mind it with the constant playing of his songs, even if he played them differently, not always as we hear them on the radio, such as a rock song being played as a slow ballad. We see his relationship with his songwriter friend who has been with him over fifty years writing with him and they both admit having a love for each other even if the writer is not gay. We see him alone for much of the movie and is not until he becomes sober that we see in the ending credit lines how he met David, his husband since the 80's, and he has managed to stay clean and still to this day continues with his writing partner of over 50 plus years. I was happy to see him go from middle income regular human to international superstar and to be able to settle into his life, finally finding peace with himself and the love that he looked for during his youth and earlier days.
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