Finally got around to catching this one Sunday at a 10:00 AM Matinee.
Highly recommended for any fan of Queen, but a great film really for anyone even marginally interested in Queen. Very honest portrayal of the complexity of Freddie Mercury's life and Rami Malek was really tremendous as Freddie. I predict a best actor nomination. Lucy Boynton equally as good as Mercury's longtime love Mary Austin, and later, as a friend after he reveals his bisexuality to her.
But more than anything else, it's the music. You almost forget the many, many great songs they wrote, the tremendous vocals and harmonies. And great that they were able to license the actual Queen recordings, not cheap re-do's, for this film. Queen members Brian May and Roger Taylor were consultants on the soundtrack. The climactic Live Aid performance at the end was very special. I happen to have it on VHS. And I saw Queen three times in the 70's so I can somewhat testify to the accuracy of this film.
[Edited on 12/12/2018 by robslob]
**Slight spoilers below. *
I really enjoyed it. There were a few timeline issues (We Will Rock You being recorded after Freddie's haircut and growing the mustache) coming up with and a couple of obvious decisions to make it a better story (the band separation in the 80s over Freddie's solo contract, no way they could have been split as long as the story that was told in the movie), however as a movie it was really good. They did a great job showing the inner struggle that Freddie must have been facing.
Rami Malek was great as Freddie, and they did a great job making everyone look like the characters they were portraying.
Perfect ending to the movie as well.
Wasn't really a Queen fan back in the day, but appreciated their talent.
Saw the movie, agree with above opinions. Definitely worth seeing if you are fan of music, especially from that era
btw I always assumed they hired a choir / backup singers for BR, its pretty cool that they did it all themselves 9with many, many overdubs)
Thought this was an excellent in-depth look at Freddie and the Queen universe. Really caught the power of Queen as a live band. The whole progression of Freddie's life and his heartfelt actions came across as authentic. Rami Malek was superb.
Like Stormy not a big Queen fan but could never get away from there music due to overwhelming popularity.
Truly enjoyed the movie, I thought Rami Malek was outstanding. Live Aid is such a great memory.
Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody crowned as most-streamed 20th-century song
https://www.cnet.com/news/queens-bohemian-rhapsody-takes-crown-as-most-streamed-20th-century-song/Queen’s iconic 1975 track Bohemian Rhapsody has become the most-streamed song from the 20th century.
https://www.digitaltrends.com/music/queens-bohemian-rhapsody-becomes-most-streamed-20th-century-song/Universal Music Group said this week that data from streaming services such as Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube show that the Bohemian Rhapsody has now been streamed 1.6 billion times globally.
Boosted by the recently released biopic of the same name, the hit song from Queen’s A Night at the Opera album jumped ahead of Nirvana’s 1991 grunge classic Smells Like Teen Spirit — now in second place with more than 1.5 billion streams — and two Guns N’ Roses tracks, namely Sweet Child O’ Mine and November Rain, in third and fourth spots, respectively.
Responding to the news, Queen guitarist Brian May said: “So the river of rock music has metamorphosed into streams. Very happy that our music is still flowing to the max.”
When it was released 43 years ago, critical reaction to the gloriously grandiose song was decidedly mixed — hardly surprising considering that no one had ever heard anything quite like it. But Bohemian Rhapsody went to become a chart-topper around the world, establishing flamboyant frontman Freddie Mercury — along with lead guitarist May, bass player John Deacon, and drummer Roger Taylor — as a force to be reckoned with.
Speaking about the single in a 2005 interview celebrating the song’s 40th anniversary, May revealed how the track almost never hit the airwaves. Lasting almost six minutes, the track was double the length of what the influential radio shows of the day would usually play, and many stations said it was simply too long to broadcast.
“We were told it was going to be a hard sell,” May said. But the guitarist said things took a turn when a prominent radio DJ “took it upon himself to go out and play it to death. That made everybody else sit up. All the rest of the radio outlets thought: ‘Oh God, we’d better get on this quick or else we’ll be left behind.'”
The song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2004, and Mercury’s vocal performance was voted by Rolling Stone readers as the best in rock history.
“Bohemian Rhapsody is one the greatest songs by one of the greatest bands in history,” said Sir Lucian Grainge, chairman and CEO of Universal Music Group. “We are so proud to represent Queen and are thrilled to see the song still inspiring new fans around the world more than four decades after its release.”
