by Todd Haynes, 1998.
Starring: Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Ewan McGregor, Toni Colette, Christian Bale, & Eddie Izzard.
Rating: 10/10, 9/10.
This review, though of a work of fiction, should nevertheless be read at maximum volume.
Everything about this film is unimaginably wonderful. My best guess for number of times that I’ve seen it is now up to about 45. Basically, it’s an extremely fictionalised account of the life & times of David Bowie (who has been renamed Brian Slade and who is played by the very very gorgeous Jonathan Rhys Meyers) from the late 60s up until the mid-70s. Also featured are a kind of hybrid of Iggy Pop’s image and Lou Reed’s life (called Curt Wild and played by the fantastically attractive Ewan McGregor), a version of Bowie’s wife Angela (now named Mandy Slade, played by the stunningly beautiful Toni Colette), an I-have-no-idea-how-related-to-the-real Tony DeFries, Bowie’s manager during those years (now Jerry Divine, played by the not-so-great-looking but great anyway Eddie Izzard), and a guy who’s a very very rabid fan in the 70s and a reporter in the 80s (whose name is Arthur Stewart—not Martha Stewart, as I thought he was saying in one scene until embarrassingly recently—and who is played by the quite nice-looking Christian Bale).
The plot is too involved, twisted, and complex for me to attempt to explain here (also for this reason, expect to have to see it more than once to figure it out—but don’t worry, it’s a pleasure each time). So I’ll talk about other things.
The costumes! Amazing (and Oscar nominated)! The acting! Incredible (not Oscar nominated, horrifyingly enough)! The script! Brilliant (also, like everything except the costumes, for some reason not nominated)! The actors! Beautiful (and in various states of undress a fair amount of the time)! The direction! Inspired! The cinematography! Ingenious! etc.
I’ll just mention a coupla cool things about the film that I think of off the top of my head (there are many, many cool things about the film that I know, and I’m sure many, many more that I don’t, but I’ll just mention a few here). The film splits its time between various points in the early seventies and scenes in 1984. This is not, however, the 1984 that happened in the real world; instead, it is a fictional 1984 (real to the movie, not to the real world...get it?) based on what the glam rock stars of the 70s (Bowie, Roxy Music, Iggy Pop, Lou Reed, T.Rex, and so forth)—and their Velvet Goldmine counterparts—feared the world would have become by that year. Dreary, unpleasant, a bit too close to Orwell’s novel for comfort.
Pay attention to Toni Colette’s accent. She (an Australian) plays an American who has come to England and appropriated an exaggerated version of the local accent to help form her new identity as "London party girl." She does amazing things with her accent, especially in her 1984 scenes, where she slips between American and English accents, with great effect. If I were in charge of the Oscars, she would have been 1998’s best actress, hands down.
OK, I guess this review is long enough. What I’m saying, basically, is SEE THIS FILM. AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. And buy the soundtrack, which is also great. And...and, let it into your life. I do believe it’s changed mine.
read roger ebert's horribly misguided review, but only so you can start to understand the enemy