Best big screen biopics: chimps, bricks, kitchen sinks, puppets and more

For those about to rock, they made a film about you! David Michael Brown curates a festival’s-worth of rock star biopics – like their subjects, coming in all shapes, sizes and styles.
The rock biopic! The joy of seeing your favourite rock or pop artist’s life played out in the silver screen is almost better than the real thing. BUT the rock biopic world is a minefield. Should the lead actor mime or should they sing? Is this real life? Is this just fantasy? Caught in a landslide, no escape from reality…
Sorry, better stop now before we do the fandango. Ahem.
As Robbie Williams makes a monkey of himself in Better Man and Pharrell Williams finds himself made of LEGO in Piece by Piece, we deep dive into the world of the cinematic rock biopic. Especially those that push the boundaries beyond the standard rags to riches cliches that blight the genre.
Directed by The Greatest Showman helmer Michael Gracey, the former Take That singer’s unlikely biopic Better Man defies expectations to deliver a bravura piece of filmmaking that is an exhilarating and emotional experience. Yes, the film inevitably descends into dodgy lookalike caricatures of the famous crowd that Williams surrounded himself with—a bête noire of the genre—especially when we meet with the Gallagher brothers of Oasis fame, but the biopic stands head and shoulders above the rest because of one simple decision:
Have Williams portrayed by a state of the art, modern Planet of the Apes-style mo-cap CGI chimpanzee.
The Angels crooner has always seen himself a little less evolved, so it’s a film about Robbie Williams from the point of view of how he sees himself. It’s a brilliant conceit. Especially when revisiting some of the monumental moments in his life including his epic residency at Knebworth where the simian Williams, portrayed with suitably athleticism by mo-cap performer Jonno Davies, and the stunning Rock DJ dance routine in London’s Piccadilly Circus and Regent Street when the film goes full Busby Berkeley musical.
Piece By Piece
Pharell Williams biography Piece by Piece sees the N.E.R.D. singer and Neptunes producer voice his own LEGO minifig. That also means we meet Snoop Dogg, Daft Punk, Kendrick Lamar and other musical luminaries, all represented by plastic playthings as the film not only tells the story of Williams’ formative years but acts as a manifesto for his creative process. Clearly made to tell his story to the younger market who made Happy such a huge hit rather than groovers who singalong “Her ass is a spaceship I want to ride” during She Wants to Move, Piece by Piece is certainly unique in the annals of the rock biopic.
The Elton John biopic Rocketman was also made with his full co-operation as Taron Egerton and Jamie Bell play the Your Song singer and his longtime writing partner Bernie Taupin in this hit-filled jukebox musical biopic following the trailblazing piano man as he travelled down the yellow brick road to play the world’s biggest stadiums.
Directed by Dexter Fletcher, the film fuses the glitz and glamour of John’s success with his council estate origins to create an outlandish fantasy that delves into the often-frazzled mind of a musical genius. John, like Williams, was a troubled soul driven by a desire to live up to his father’s high expectations. This familial conflict bookended by a help group session that John attends in typically devilish stage attire. Soundtracked by the artist formally known as Reg Dwight’s most famous songs, all sung with aplomb by Egerton.
Another film that deep dived into the fractured psyche of its chief protagonist was Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life. French crooner Serge Gainsbourg was a national treasure, known as much for his “rock ‘n’ roll” excesses and torrid relationships with the likes of Brigitte Bardot, Jean Seberg, Bamboo and Jane Birkin as he was for his admittedly formidable song repertoire that reached its peak with the album Histoire de Melody Nelson in 1971.
At odds with his success, Gainsbourg created an alter ego called “Gainsbarre” who repeatedly haunted his lyrics, a depressive dipsomaniac to blame all of his transgressions upon. In While Eric Elmosnino did a sterling job playing the French singer in Joann Sfar’s film, a thin grotesque puppet was used to portray “Gainsbarre” exaggerating his features, especially his ears and nose to become a gross anti-Semitic caricature of Gainsbourg (the son of Russian-Jewish migrants). A malevolent spirit representing his inner demons.
The polar opposite to these dark twisted fantasies was Sid & Nancy. Unlike the biopics already mentioned, this was not made with the approval of any of the Sex Pistols. Directed by cult favourite Alex Cox of Repo Man, this often-harrowing look at the tragic life of Sex Pistol bassist Sid Vicious (Gary Oldman) and the love of his life Nancy Spungen (Chloe Webb), is at once touching and distressing thanks to sterling work from the two leads.
The film also saw the band’s lead singer Johnny Lydon vent his vitriol on many an occasion. “It was all someone else’s fucking fantasy, some Oxford graduate who missed the punk rock era. The bastard,” he wrote in his 1994 autobiography. But while the film may not have nailed, or safety pinned, the filth and the fury of the punk era in Rotten’s opinion at least, as a damaged love story it rocks. Like the terrible David Bowie biopic Stardust, no permission was given to use the Pistols music, so the band is only seen playing the cover versions they performed at the time.
Much like Williams’ lovingly recreated working class early years in Stoke playing football as a chimp, photographer-turned-director Anton Corbijn took the gritty kitchen sink approach telling the story of the tragically short life of Joy Division frontman Ian Curtis in the biopic Control. The morose post-punk poet, played brilliantly by Sam Riley, found himself begrudgingly at the forefront of a music revolution in the UK in the late 70s with songs like She’s Lost Control, Isolation and Love Will Tear Us Apart.
Following the band through their early performances in London in 1978 to the shocking on stage seizure brought on by epilepsy, and Curtis’s eventual suicide in 1980, it’s a fascinating deep dive into the Manchester music scene that would influence music for decades to come. The band were signed to Factory Records and played at the legendary Manchester venue, The Haçienda nightclub.
Both were founded by Tony Wilson, who was the subject of Michael Winterbottom’s brilliant 24 Hour Party People. As played by a fourth wall-breaking Steve Coogan, Wilson was part musical genius, part Alan Partridge. He may have been smug but he had his finger on the pulse. Winterbottom, making the most of his lead, ups the Manc humour inherent in his subject and the likes of Happy Mondays’ duo Shaun Ryder and Bez.
Bohemian Rhapsody
Punk had always rallied against the rock dinosaurs who graced stadiums throughout the 70s. One such vilified behemoth was Queen, the subject of Bohemian Rhapsody. Despite accusations that the film played hard and fast with the timeline of events and often sanitised the more salacious aspects of the band’s rock ‘n roll lifestyle (and the fact that director Bryan Singer was fired), the Freddie Mercury biopic was a box-office smash and an Academy Award favourite, including a Best Actor Oscar for Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury.
Telling the story of Queen and their flamboyant frontman’s rise from pub gigs to conquering Live Aid on the hallowed Wembley Stadium stage in 1985, the fastidiously accurate reproduction of the band’s legendary set at the charity event raised the roof, even though the London venue didn’t have one.
I'm Not There
Far less traditional, Todd Haynes’ I’m Not There is possibly the most unconventional biopic of them all. Why have one actor playing Bob Dylan when you can have seven. Cate Blanchett, Ben Wishaw, Christian Bale, Richard Gere, Heath Ledger and Marcus Carl Franklin all took on the role of the folk legend, each representing one of the many different facets of his public persona. Having already made the short film Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story in 1987 and his faux David Bowie biopic Velvet Goldmine in 1998, including Ewan McGregor as a raucous rocker not to dissimilar to Iggy Pop, director Todd Haynes gave his Bob Dylan biopic his own idiosyncratic style.
A Complete Unknown
Next year, James Mangold (who already directed Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line starring Joaquin Phoenix as Johnny Cash and an Oscar-winning Reese Witherspoon as his muse June Carter), has a Bob Dylan biopic about to step onto the cinematic stage. However, where his Man in Black movie focused on the tumultuous highs and soul-destroying lows of their fractious but loving relationship in the limelight, A Complete Unknown, starring Timothée Chalamet as the acoustic troubadour, highlights one particular, culturally impactful, performance.
Based on the 2015 book Dylan Goes Electric! Newport, Seeger, Dylan, and the Night that Split the Sixties by Elijah Wald, the forthcoming feature focuses not only on a pivotal moment on Dylan’s career but one of the most transformative moments in 20th century music—when he stepped onto the stage at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965 and played electric guitar! The folk fraternity were in shock and Dylan announced himself as the voice of a generation.
By only portraying an electrifying moment in his life, the film will capture the very essence of the performer. And not a CGI monkey or a piece of LEGO in sight!