Elvis has not left the building.
Baz Luhrmann’s new film is a whirling, vigorous rise and plunge that’s held together by its two leads, the uncannily dead-on Austin Butler as Elvis and an almost unrecognizable Tom Hanks as Colonel Tom Parker. It’s hard to be completely spoiler-free here, so be warned.
The movie ticks the usual biopic boxes. While the relationship between Elvis and Parker is the main focus, it skims over Elvis’s life without getting too deeply into anything. It’s got texts and freeze frames. It’s got a few freak-outs, including a strung-out Elvis shooting hotel TVs, natch. Tom Parker fills in the blanks with frequent and loving narration.
And it’s got The Montage, or in Elvis’s case, The Montage On Steroids. As in, most of the movie is a montage. In true Baz Luhrmann style, there are a lot of quick cuts and pans with just a dash of step printing. In Romeo and Juliet this approach got messy but Luhrmann shows maturity in Elvis. While it can be argued that a biopic montage can be cheap filler, it serves as nonverbal exposition in this movie, giving it energy and illustrating how frenetic Elvis’s life really was.
Most of the time, anyway. Tom Parker’s narration can get a little cheesy.
Austin Butler is absolutely perfect as Elvis. He’s got the moves down. He lip-synchs to Elvis’s voice perfectly, and the dividing line between he and the real Elvis is almost seamless. The movie explores Elvis’s friendship with B.B. King, which made for some of the nicest moments because Elvis was clearly comfortable with B.B. and loved blues music. I don’t think the real Elvis and B.B. were ever able to do a show together but I wish they had because it would have been electric.
Tom Hanks’s Colonel Parker is almost creepy because we hear Tom Hanks but see Tom Parker. Parker’s accent goes between a light southern drawl to kinda-not-really-Dutch, and the character is like Svengali, trying to mold Elvis into the singer he wanted him to be, preferably sans all the scandalous pelvis shaking. Parker spends the movie jerking metaphorical strings and staring at Elvis from around curtains and behind fences like Gollum jonesing over the One Ring. Elvis was a commodity to Parker, who didn’t care how worn-out his client was as long as he made money.
Also very good is Richard Roxburgh as Vernon Presley, although I wonder if Roxburgh’s natural reserve played into his characterization—Vernon spends a lot of time creeping around doors and looking uncomfortable. The real Vernon seemed a bit more aggressive, but seeing as the film has two very strong leads, maybe Roxburgh underplayed to offset the tension.
The chemistry between Elvis and Priscilla, played by Olivia DeJonge, was a lot of fun most of the time, but in the grand scheme of things she’s a pretty minor character, as is Gladys, Elvis’s mother, played by Helen Thompson. Elvis’s grief when his mother dies is as palpable in the film as it was in real life.
While the movie is strong it does have a few flaws. I wish they had slowed down at times so the audience could get a breather and get to know these characters a bit, but it never really does. It’s just cut-cut-cut-whirl almost all the way through, so the viewer hasn’t much of a choice but to grab on and hold tight.
Fortunately it’s a pleasure. If Butler doesn’t get the Best Actor Oscar I don’t know what’s wrong with the Academy. He carries Elvis right to the end, and when the King sings “Unchained Melody” both the film audience and the audience in my theater applauded with relief because the King had made it. It was a last gasp of air, one last triumph before the final fadeout.
The best thing about the movie is that it shows the pull Elvis still has as a person and a performer. I saw Elvis at a fan screening last night. The house was packed with Silent Generation folks like my parents and Gen-Xers like me, and throughout the movie everyone was almost silent with respect and awe at seeing Elvis alive again. However, when the film reached its crucial final moments, which aren’t exactly a mystery, everyone applauded and cheered as if Elvis was in the room with us. Maybe, for just a brief moment, he really was.
Elvis opens in theaters on June 24. Rated PG-13.
My grade: A
Principal cast: Austin Butler, Tom Hanks, Helen Thompson, Richard Roxburgh, Olivia DeJonge, Dacre Montgomery, Kelvin Harrison, Jr., David Wenham, Natasha Bassett
Director: Baz Luhrmann
Writers: Baz Luhrmann, Sam Bromell, Craig Pierce, and Jeremy Doner.