I should have known better. I have a habit of watching movies alone. There are some movie shows that you must not and cannot see all by your sweet self. You do not want to be cringing and screaming by your sweet self in a suspense or horror film like A Quiet Place. Nor do you burst out into uncontrollable laughter in comedic highlights, right?
But nobody prepared me for Rocketman, a retelling of the life of singer and pop icon Elton John through the thread of his most memorable songs. Yes, friends already told me that the film was good --- better than that Freddy Mercury bioflick --- but then I always felt they were biased. Belonging to the High School Class of 1972, our youthful memories are all stuffed with the songs of Elton John together with Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Carole King, Carly Simon and, uh, Jim Morrison and Carlos Santana.
Yet all these givens in my life should have been a telltale sign of how I was going to react to his film, seated alone on D-16 Cinema 4, inside a movie house where less than 30% of the seats were occupied. OK, right. The kids of nowadays may have never heard of Elton John or his music. Generations have their own preferences and benchmarks and maybe the lyrics of Bernie Taupin and the melodies of Elton did not come across to them as relevant to their tastes and mindsets. But still.
What I did not know was that this was a musical.
No, it is not your usual cut-and-paste jukebox musical featuring all the famous songs of a group threaded together to make a story. Not Rocketman that used the songs of an artist to narrate the highlights and lowest points of his life, to illustrate his relationship with family, friends and colleagues ... and to blueprint that arc of his rise and fall and resurrection.
And because these songs are the songs of my youth --- the memories of my high school and college days --- I was this pathetic piece of sponge absorbing everything and by the time Your Song was played to illustrate how this classic was reimagined in its creation, I found tears uncontrollably streaming down my face under the comfortable darkness of a cinema.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uij9eiwwG0
This was not merely a movie for me but an experience. It was a unique experience of understanding a man in his music without the sanitation and safety nets found in the Freddy Mercury biography. Here was a barenaked look at a life of an artist, a composer and his relationship with his lyricist --- and the price he had to pay for his fame as well as the pain he had to go through to be able to create his art.
My friends who saw the film earlier were right. This was not only about our generation --- but a beautifully crafted depiction of the making of an idol and his musical creations.
When the movie ended and the lights went on, I realized that fifteen minutes into the film I was not seeing a Welsh actor named Taron Egerton but Elton John. The man was not lipsyncing original recordings ... but doing his own singing. It was even shocking for me to find out that that familiar face I could not categorically identify was Bryce Dallas Howard as Elton's mother.
OK, enough said. This afternoon, alone in the cinema, I must have watched what could be my best film for the year. And I wish that this film directed by Dexter Fletcher receives not only the accolades but also the audience that it so deserves.
Excuse me, but I am putting on my headset and listening to Your Song for the umpteenth time.
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