BEFORE: So the channel I've just discovered is called Fuse Music, it's number 292 on my cable guide, and it seems to be mostly documentaries about famous rock and pop musicians - this is a very dangerous thing for me to be aware of. If I just watched this channel, my Doc Block might take up a few months or even the whole year, and we can't have that. I stumbled on this channel when I did a search in the on-screen guide for "Elton John" to see if that live concert was playing anywhere on cable. Of course it's not, that's a Disney Plus exclusive. But it kind of didn't feel right to cover Elton John in the Doc Block without a proper documentary about him, so I'm willing to give this one a whirl (and one other, about David Bowie, which should slot in rather nicely next week) however I suspect that this is not really a quality product being put out by the Fuse Music channel, as I've never heard of any of their docs before.
The standard is probably still the PBS show "American Masters", which shows their own produced docs and also buys the rights to other notable ones (like "LennoNYC") and so I doubt that "Becoming Rocketman" is going to really cover its subject matter in-depth, but hey, you never know, I still might learn something. Anyway if I just add these two last docs then the Doc Block will line up better with the calendar, so there's that. But if I'm two slots short at the end of the Movie Year, I'm going to be very upset.
Elton John carries over from yesterday's concert film "Farewell from Dodger Stadium".
THE PLOT: With the release of the box office hit "Rocketman", his autobiography and his farewell tour, all eyes are on the musical genius Elton John. We take a glimpse into his incredible journey and uncover the truth behind the turbulent and eccentric life of a superstar.
AFTER: Well, I was right, this is a piece of rubbish. If I give it a low score today it's not meant to be a knock against Elton John or his career or his lifestyle or anything like that, I'm just rating the production quality of the film, which is just horrible. It's thrown together from archive footage - hell, many docs are - but also, they only interviewed TWO people, who claim to be music journalists, and I have no reason to suspect they aren't, but then the film is just comments from two people who aren't very articulate, and neither one knows Elton personally. The main problem with their speaking manner is that they repeat themselves over and over, which makes them both long-winded AND boring, but they take up more screen time that way, which is probably what the film's producers had in mind. Every single point is belabored, again and again, because they both talk in circles.
Also, there's really no new information here, nothing that you can't get from Elton John's Wiki page, so really, why bother? Just post a link to Wikipedia and be done with it. This doc makes "I Am Chris Farley" look like "Gone with the Wind". OK, maybe not, but it's the same level of repeating footage and making the same points again and again, and one more time to make sure you REALLY got it.
Elton John changed his name from Reginald Dwight, sure, we all know that, but this doc spends a good ten minutes on that, speculating WHY and what that brought him at that point in his career - it's a two-minute topic at best, why beat it into the ground? His name changed, does this mean his personality changed at the same time? Who cares? At that point he stopped answering to the name "Reg" whenever his friends spoke to him. So what? And how could YOU possibly know that? Who the hell are you, anyway, what respected musical magazine do you write puff pieces for? I supposed this is a little more focused than a 30-second profile on "Entertainment Tonight" or "Extra", but not by much.
OMG, did you know Elton John was GAY? OMG, did you know that back then that wasn't as culturally acceptable as it is now? OMG, did you know he's been in a relationship for over two decades? Yes, we've all been through this, because some of us pay attention. OMG, did you know he was briefly married to a woman? Yes, yes, we've all been through this before, because we all saw "Rocketman", and that dispensed with the topic in about 30 seconds of screen time, without really telling us anything.
Well, if you're a big fan of documentaries that don't tell you anything that you don't already know, or if you've just landed on Earth, then you may want to check out this doc on the Fuse Music channel to get yourself up to speed. You'll also non-learn that Elton John has made millions of dollars, and that he's given a lot to charity and done a lot of work for AIDS charities. Let's see, we've got the name change, the gay angle, the weird marriage, the tribute song for Princess Diana, now promote the upcoming film "Rocketman" and let's get the hell out of here. We've got to get twelve more of these documentaries edited today for next week's programming.
Anyway, I took note of who appeared in all the archive footage and updated this film's IMDB listing - I was a bit surprised to find that this cobbled-together shit-show even HAD an IMDB listing.
Also starring Sid Griffin, Ashley Pearson
with archive footage of Kiki Dee (also carrying over from "Elton John LIve: Farewell from Dodger Stadium", David Furnish (ditto), Bernie Taupin (ditto), Bono (last seen in "Air"), Prince (now King) Charles (ditto), Princess Diana (ditto), George Michael (ditto), Lucy Boynton (last seen in "Barbie"), Prince Harry (last seen in "Scandalous: The Untold Story of the National Enquirer"), Prince William (ditto), Michael Jackson (ditto), Barry Gibb (last seen in "Dionne Warwick: Don't Make Me Over"), Maurice Gibb (ditto), Robin Gibb (ditto), John Lennon (last seen in "LennoNYC"), Rami Malek (last seen in "Oppenheimer"), Brian May (last seen in "Count Me In"), Elvis Presley (last seen in "Being Mary Tyler Moore"), Gianni Versace, Ryan White.
RATING: 3 out of 10 performances at the Troubadour
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