seen on 29 October 2018
A film with a troubled production history looks at the life and career of Freddie Mercury, lead singer of Queen, but it barely digs below the surface. Two surviving members of the band were executive music producers of the film; perhaps the desire to ensure wide circulation by having a '12A' classification (in Britain) prevented any chance of depicting Mercury's life style in anything but fairly anodyne terms. Brian Singer is credited as director, though actually Dexter Fletcher completed the job after Singer was sacked.
Nonetheless on its own terms it delivers the music in stomping good form, with convincing re-creations of various hits, and 'amalgamations' in the soundtrack (whatever that may mean). The film begins with Mercury (Rami Malek) walking on to the stage at Wembley for the Live Aid concert of 1985, then flashes back to the first meeting between him and drummer Roger Taylor (Ben Hardy) and guitarist Brian May (Gwilym Lee). On the same evening (here) he meets Mary Austin (Lucy Boynton) to whom he eventually becomes engaged, though their relationship founders as they have to come to terms with Freddie's sexuality.
