Luhrmann takes a different approach, imagining Elvis less as a holy fool and more as a willing mirror for the desires of others-someone who understands that mutual exploitation is the necessary cost of achieving his goals. It’s nearly impossible, at this point, to separate Elvis’s biography from this all-American myth of the purehearted, uncultivated hick-genius. Luhrmann’s Elvis is unique in that it deviates from the commonly told legend of Presley: that of a simple country boy with an untamable talent, devoted to Jesus and his mother Gladys, whom he was often seen nuzzling and calling his “best girl.” According to received wisdom-purveyed by John Carpenter in his 1979 made-for-TV Elvis-the singer’s talents lacked any design: that feverish music and those frenzy-inducing dance moves simply sprang from Elvis’s loins fully formed. In this sense, the filmmaker has perhaps found his perfect match: a performer whose humanity shone through even the glitziest rhinestone-encrusted suits. The movie’s CGI flourishes and gaudy rap remixes pale against this image of a middle-aged man at the end of his rope, barely able to stand up but still finding solace in his art as he belts out a spine-tingling version of the cornball “Unchained Melody.” How do you communicate on screen the loneliness and pain of a figure who is more metaphor than man? Luhrmann’s answer (as always) is to go as big as possible in every way. The shock of the real that occurs near the film’s end, when Luhrmann cuts to archival documentary footage of Presley’s final 1977 performance, renders this blockbuster unexpectedly heartbreaking. One of the strangest, most improbable effects of Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis is that after over two and half hours of unrelenting garishness, the film’s obnoxious editing, historical inaccuracy, obvious dialogue, and didactic sermonizing suddenly melt away. This article appeared in the Jedition of The Film Comment Letter, our free weekly newsletter featuring original film criticism and writing.
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