From The Lion King

To The Beatles, The

Musical Reinvented

By Sandra Olmsted

Recently, the music of Aretha Franklin, Queen, Elton John, The Beatles, and many more musicians have featured prominently in a number of films. Expect this musical-themed trend to continue because many more music-themed films are in the hopper for release, including Bruce “The Boss” Springsteen and Judy Garland films, respectively. So, why all the music-themed documentaries, biopics, and films?

In the year and a half before Bohemian Rhapsody was released, I suddenly heard Queen’s music on the radio repeatedly and even went to a symphonic concert of the groups’ music. For the producers of the Bohemian Rhapsody, the hype paid off with a worldwide $903,655,259 box office take. However, the owners of Queen’s music also benefited from not only the nostalgia of fans but the introduction of Queen’s music to a new generation of listeners.

Amazing Grace, which featured Aretha Franklin performing gospel music with the Los Angeles New Bethel Baptist Church choir in 1972, earned $4,444,397 domestically in theaters, which does not including streaming numbers. Movies about musicians and their music make what’s old new again, especially, for those who haven’t heard the music before, especially when their music is timeless.

Rocketman and Yesterday, which are in theaters now, promise similar results for the owners of musical and/or distribution rights of Elton John’s and The Beatles’ music catalogs, respectively. The films also provide solid entertainment not just for Baby-Boomer fans, but also for that prized audience of up-and-coming generations. While Rocketman is purely a biopic about Elton John’s (Taron Egerton) rise to fame, Yesterday imaginatively uses a hip, young cast to ask the audience to imagine a world without The Beatles. After a worldwide blackout, Jack (Himesh Patel) awakens from a coma to find that he’s the only person who remembers The Beatles’ songs — maybe.

Blinded by the Light, one of the next “music-trend” films does the same for Bruce Springsteen’s music. In the 1987 austerity of Thatcher’s Britain, Javed (Viveik Kalra), a Pakistani British teenager, discovers that The Boss’ music speaks to him despite the cultural differences. Blinded by the Light opens August 14.

In Judy, Renee Zellweger portrays Judy Garland and is getting accolades for her performance. The film chronicles Garland’s troubles in 1968 when her career was spiraling downward, and she had to leave her children in America to perform a series of concert in London. Judy opens on September 27.

In addition to these films, many more “music-trend” films have been or will be released. Opening July 19, although probably not wide, David Crosby: Remember My Name documents rock star David Crosby of Crosby, Stills & Nash (and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young) reflecting on his career, life, career, and “high” times.

Other documentaries about musicians include Woodstock: Three Days That Defined a Generation, for the 50th anniversary of the 1970 festival; The Quiet One, about the Rolling Stone’s founding bassist Bill Wyman; and Electric Church, the Showtime doc about Jimi Hendrix, which is getting a theatrical run. Playing the festival circuits currently are two more “music–trend” films: Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice celebrating the country-rock singer’s music with performances by many big names, and D’Angelo: Devil’s Pie chronicling the titular R&B performer’s decade-long sabbatical before his return with Black Messiah.

Another music-trend film in the works, the Warner Bros./Baz Luhrmann Elvis Presley biopic, has finally tapped Austin Butler to play king of rock ‘n’ roll after many screen tests. The film may be in production now.

All these music-trend films point to the connection between commerce and art required to make and promote artforms that require the cooperation of many artists and executives to create. Film certainly is an art that requires infrastructure to make, and, since most record labels are some in kind of cooperative relationship with a motion picture studio, revitalizing the work of existing rock stars has the potential for nostalgic audiences in theater seats and future sales of music to new and existing fans.

These films are also a revitalization of the classic Hollywood genre of the musical. One could also say that Disney’s The Lion King, which roars into theaters on July 19, is another reinvention of the musical. Although director Jon Favreau’s The Lion King follows the original’s script very closely, the all-new cast, including Donald Glover, Beyoncé, and Seth Rogen, and the pioneering live-action-animation look and computer-generated-images (CGI) technique make for a stunning film. I will say that the live-action look makes the dramatic sequences more frighteningly violent and probably inappropriate for young children.

Since the decline in musicals in the mid-twentieth century, animated films have carried the genre, and Disney’s new version of The Lion King is no exception with a great sound track of the familiar songs re-recorded by the new cast. Disney’s The Lion King is rated PG for sequences of violence and peril, and some thematic elements and runs an exciting 118 minutes. For those who remember Disney’s live-action nature and animal “docu-dramas” from the 1960s, this film will provide another form of nostalgia.

Here’s to musicals alive on the big screen again!

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