Review of Elvis (2022) by Theredsky — 05 Jul 2022

I’m usually not a Baz Luhrmann fan but his style and the high energy of a man like Elvis work almost perfectly together. This is what a movie like Bohemian Rhapsody should have been. This takes the grandeur of a man like Elvis and the energy of Baz Luhrmann and you get this.

Luhrmann’s style can still be annoying here in regards to some of the editing and the use of modern music for a movie that takes place between 40-70 years ago. The editing works most of the time but there are definitely scenes where it can start to feel a little nauseating.

The ending also turns into your standard biopic with the real life footage and after screen text and all that but the rest of the film is great. Austin Butler is absolutely amazing here. One of my favorite performances of the year so far.

He gets the mannerisms and singing of Elvis almost down to a T. His singing scenes especially were some of my favorite moments in the film especially when he sings “If I can Dream”. That’s my favorite scene in the film.

Tom Hanks was kind of a mixed bag for me. Sometimes his over the top performance and accent worked and other times it was distracting but it isn’t the worst thing in the world. I will say though that I could barely recognize that Tom Hanks was playing the character.

The energy of this film and the visuals are great. The energy keeps me from getting bored. Any other director would have made this film boring but Luhrmann used that energy to make boring scenes really interesting and engaging.

The musical segments themselves are incredibly well done. Elvis’s first singing scene in the film is great. I already mentioned the “If I Can Dream” song and anything relating to the Vegas Hotel was very well done as well.

The music is obviously great and even some of the more modern songs are good when they aren’t attached to the film. The film definitely isn’t historically accurate and they do gloss over some of the more controversial aspects about him.

They don’t ignore them but they don’t dive deep into them which I wish they had done. If you like musical biopics or you want something different out of the biopic genre along with being an Elvis or Baz Luhrmann fan then I definitely would recommend checking this out.