Elvis Review

Elvis Presley transcends the medium, and Austin Butler absorbs that well. It is near impossible to tell it is him caked up in makeup with his hair quaffed like The King once did. Elvis is a stunning collection of lives well-lived and unfortunately ruptured by grifters, and Baz Luhrmann directs that with pride. It is not the articulate masterclass of biopic features, it is the safe and big-screen-ready entertainment that audiences should expect of the Luhrmann tag, but there is enough within to make Elvis and this spotty collection of facts relatively endearing to the passing viewer. Take it as the starting pistol, the gunshot that spurs movement toward a goal. If that goal is the pursuit of learning more about one of the all-time greats, then Elvis is the great entry point.

Much of that relies on the back and forth between Butler and Tom Hanks’ rendition of Colonel Tom Parker, which looks eerily like Goldmember from Austin Powers in Goldmember. His presentation here is a man that bullied and belittled his way into big fortunes and squandered it all in a purgatory explained in one line of text as the credits prepare to roll. Shameful that lack of punishment on-screen for the man that ruined another man may be, it is simple enough to be understood. Much of Elvis is simple, for the sake of dragging along a new audience to a singer they will certainly have heard of but may not have engaged with. Even if they have, it may just be the Hound Dog or Blue Suede Shoes heard offhand on the jukebox of a relative of seniority. Elvis works as a great entry point, the pizzazz and flashy show business as appealing as it is disturbing.

Take those screaming fans that lined the crowds for those gyrations of great disruption. Tabloid-like introductions to the rise and rise of a star that was destined to fall are shown through those early moments very well. Cut like a finale of 24 and showering the Snowman and Showman relationship well, Luhrmann cements some key and recurring moments well. Tabloid exposure, is the fear of not holding a legacy after their demise, regardless of how excruciatingly, tragically early that may be. Elvis at forty-two did not feel a legacy, that is what Luhrmann implies. The obvious contrast there is monumental, a level exposed only by The Beatles and Presley. No other audience was screaming, crying and weeping for just a second of their attention.

Wild influences and assertations are made throughout Elvis and whether or not Lurhmann is committed to defending them is completely unknowable. Was Elvis a treasure who championed a heard but shunned field of music? Was he a man whose independence as a unique artist was a grift of a genre that was heard but ignored? Luhrmann answers neither because to make such a statement shifts the conversation Elvis presents from the tragedy of exhaustion and the touring artist trapped in his own success to the questions over his rise and rise. Parker was responsible for that, he was also responsible for the downfall and greed that befell an artist who, while offering so much, could have maintained course and offered so much more. Elvis is a tragedy, a broad one at that.