The recent history of poptastic blockbuster biopics goes: Freddie Mercury’s Bohemian Rhapsody (loved and loathed); Elton John’s Rocketman (adored) and Aretha Franklin’s Respect (already forgotten). Now, thrusting his way into the fray with all the subtlety of a Las Vegas jumpsuit, is Baz Luhrmann’s bold jukebox musical film about Elvis Presley.
“The fans will love it or hate it,” the Australian director says with a shrug when we meet after its premiere at Cannes, where it divided the critics. What will the King’s legion of followers make of a film that includes a rap by Eminem? Expect fireworks.
“I wasn’t really thinking about the fans,” Luhrmann declares. “I used Elvis as a canvas to explore America in the Fifties, Sixties and Seventies. I did not set out to make a biopic.”
Yet his film is still called Elvis. So far so very Baz. Exuberance is his calling card: from his sensual, modern Romeo + Juliet starring Leonardo DiCaprio to his brash retelling of The Great Gatsby and the wild Moulin Rouge! with Nicole Kidman dancing to Nirvana in the Parisian brothels of 1900.
I’ve never met a director who dresses so much like his films. There’s the little silver quiff, a huge ring encrusted with jewels spelling out EP — Elvis Presley — and even a glasses strap made with pearls. Luhrmann throws himself into every sentence with equal flamboyance. Baz is also, which we will get to, a name-dropper like no other. You will not believe the names he leaves on the floor.
Advertisement
We start in Heron’s Creek, a speck of a place on the remote New South Wales coast where Luhrmann was brought up in the 1960s. There was nothing to do, but boredom informed the man that Luhrmann became.
He was saved by films, thanks to the local cinema, where footage of the Queen on a horse would appear as the red curtain went up, before the audience sang the national anthem.
“The whole experience was theatrical,” Luhrmann says with a smile. “And when you’re in a tiny town, if your Saturday night movie is not a theatrical experience there is nothing else. I spent a week waiting for it and it is in my DNA. Ever since I’ve been on a mission. My films are visceral and participatory. Why do we love laughing with strangers? Because you don’t feel lonely. My films are a collective experience, like a banquet. Maybe I serve too much food, but I do banquets.”
So his Elvis is fun. When the story reaches the singer’s obese period, Presley (played by a committed Austin Butler) looks more like a pot-bellied Brit after two weeks in Marbella.
At almost three hours long, the film packs a lot in. It starts at the beginning of Presley’s life in Tupelo, Mississippi, in 1935 and rock’n’rolls to its end at Graceland in 1977. It is also the tale of Colonel Parker (an odd turn from Tom Hanks), who made Presley a star.
Advertisement
The gigs are wonderful, from the first flush of screaming girls to the drug-fuelled Las Vegas residency of the later years. Butler thrives during the “Elvis the Pelvis” teen idol era, but also captures the older artist who crooned the peerless Suspicious Minds.
Fashions change throughout. “Elvis had incredible style,” Luhrmann says, beaming. “Before people talked about [gender] fluidity, he had knitted bolero tank tops with his midriff hanging out, truck driver sideburns, make-up and dyed black hair. He wore what would have been called, in the 19th century, dandy clothes.”
I mention Harry Styles — a dandy, but one of our age. “I know Harry well,” Luhrmann says, his first name-drop. “He sent me a video of him impersonating Elvis as a six-year-old. Harry embodies so much of Elvis. He has the nail polish, feather boa and sparkly jumpsuit. Yet he’s incredibly masculine. Mick Jagger? Same thing. But Elvis did it first, in terms of the white performers.”
Luhrmann is “good pals” with Jagger too. “Mick once said to me,” he says before launching into an impeccable impression: “‘Is Elvis really that interesting?’” Luhrmann told Jagger he was not sure, but then researched a lot andthe resulting film will surely follow Bohemian Rhapsody and be nominated for a best picture Oscar.
As the politics of the time change in Elvis, the film becomes as much about the moments Presley lived through as the man. “There was a sexual awakening, an explosion — young people were f***ing.” His thrusts and pouts on television were blamed for a postwar boom in teenage delinquency. And in the South he also provoked a backlash from the segregationists after fusing black and white music. “Elvis became a political problem,” Luhrmann says. “It was dangerous for him — they were hanging effigies of him in the South. They thought he was the most dangerous man on the planet.”
Advertisement
One montage has Presley watching a black blues man play That’s All Right. Then the King records his own version and makes a hit. Luhrmann shakes his head when I suggest that it looks like a comment on white musicians culturally appropriating black music. “It is cultural absorption,” he corrects.
Has Luhrmann made Presley more liberal than he was? The film shows him being devastated by the deaths of Martin Luther King and a couple of Kennedys, while in reality he made few, if any, political statements. Presley visited President Nixon at the White House, an episode Luhrmann ignores. “I’m not making an excuse for Elvis, but by the time he gets into the Nixon thing he is such a wackadoo drug head.” Luhrmann claims that Presley adored the Kennedys and could recite King’s “I have a dream” speech by heart (he even sang a tribute, If I Can Dream). The director cites In the Ghetto as evidence of Presley’s interest in civil rights.
Then, aged 42, Elvis died. “It’s like he lived a 100-year life,” Luhrmann says with a sigh. His film is framed around a question: did Parker create Presley, or push him so hard that he killed him? The answer is both — the history of pop music is littered with such stories.
● Ranked: the top 15 Elvis songs
“When Michael Jackson died the first thing we wanted were more records. And I knew Michael.” (Of course.) “But we want our heroes to be eternally young. Now, David Bowie was a great icon and we became friends towards the end of his life.” (Naturally.) “We were good friends. And the thing about David, as opposed to Michael or Elvis, is he changed persona. He was playing a character, David Bowie. That’s not him — he’s David Jones. He could peel off his persona. Prince also never broke character — I worked with him twice.” (Needless to say.) “And Elvis said, ‘I’m so tired of playing Elvis Presley.’ It’s very hard to live up to an image and that’s ultimately what kills them.”
Advertisement
Presley, though, lives on. A couple of years ago Spotify revealed that the King is streamed more by 18 to 22-year-olds than the middle-aged. That said, his monthly numbers (12.5 million) are dwarfed by Queen’s (39.5 million) and Elton John’s (47.6 million) — figures boosted by their biopics. (Aretha Franklin remains stuck on 9.3 million.)
Will Elvis make a similar comeback? Luhrmann hopes so. With a typical flourish, he sees Presley as a poster boy for a world where the sell has become more powerful than the soul. “It’s left creativity, spirituality and humanity in the descendant... In life there’s so much stuff, so little content.”
Elvis is out in cinemas on Jun 24
