Wow. What a brilliantly made film. Brian Singer (The Usual Suspects, X-Men) has walked a sublime tightrope of a wonderful engaging, funny and emotional film without turning it into a turgid Hollywood smarm fest. Rami Malek is of course the star and his performance as Freddie is uncanny. Most of the vocals were Freddies originals but he does attempt some of his own,with commendable success, and you quickly forget it's not actually Mr Mercury himself.
Unlike some biopics the music itself does by no means fall by the wayside and there is a multitude of Queen classics crammed into the just over 2 hours running time. And with Roger Taylor and Brian May as the executive music producers for the film expect nothing less. I was pleasantly surprised as to how much of the movie was dedicated to the music and if I wasn't in a cinema I would have spent half the time air guitaring and singing at the top of my voice. Of course we have a lot of the film dedicated to Freddie and his declining social life, behavior and ultimately health, and this is handled with so much respect and emotion that at no point does it seem forced or uncomfortable.
The film follows a classic rise, fall and rise again formula culminating in a final fist pumping, rousing half hour which sees the band bust out (what some say is) the greatest live performance of all time as they re-emerge for Wembleys Live-aid concert.
Realistically the film won't go down as an all time classic and may not be up for any Oscars (except for Maleks performance maybe) but what we do get is a barnstorming, foot-tapping, heart pumping movie which for me is without a doubt one of the greatest Music biopics ever made. Go see it.