Elvis Presley had a bad year last year. He made only $30 million in 2021, according to Forbes, which calculates the deceased's take-home income. This is less than Bing Crosby and Dr. Seuss but more than Arnold Palmer. However, Elvis can relax. With Austin Butler playing the titular character in the most recent Baz Luhrmann film, "Elvis," his pay this year may see a welcome increase. Purists will find enough to criticize, and Presleyologists will learn nothing from this. However, Luhrmann's engaging presentation of the story may certainly draw in those with less knowledge. Not for suspicious minds is this film.
A hop, skip, and a leap from one highlight to the next is a structure that will be recognizable to any lover of musical biopics. (Obviously, some of the highs are also lows.) In the case of Elvis, this means that we first see him as a young man, as portrayed by the stunning Chaydon Jay, whose uncommon intensity of gaze truly distinguishes the young actor. Moving quickly, we see Elvis making a pit break as a truck driver with his guitar slung over his shoulder like a rifle; the iconic image of Elvis on stage, lovely in pink and energizing a crowd; Elvis on the Steve Allen program, in a white tie and tails; and, last, Elvis as a truck driver. Elvis escapes to Memphis' Beale Street to hang out with B. B. King (Kelvin Harrison, Jr.) and enjoy Little Richard (Alton Mason), singing "Hound Dog" to a depressed dog; Elvis performs in residence at the International Hotel in Las Vegas, flush with renewed success; Elvis mourning the deaths of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy; Elvis lounging inside a vowel on the Hollywood sign; Elvis pitching his woo to Priscilla (Olivia DeJonge), the daughter of a captain; Elvis dressed impeccably sharply in Army uniform; When Elvis, who was lamentably seated in a vehicle next to a private plane, and stating, "Priscilla, I'm going to turn forty shortly. Forty.” Has he never considered getting older before? He passes away two years later, albeit the film spares us the unpleasant details of his demise.
Colonel Tom Parker is our guide through this peculiar story, in which even the most private moments seem like public property. He wasn't a proper colonel, Parker, or even Tom, as has long been known. He was a Dutchman named Andreas Cornelis van Kuijk who traveled to America and casually created a new persona for himself. He rose to prominence as Elvis' manager, magus, MC, and (some would say) terminator. Kevin Spacey would be a perfect match for the role if he weren't already booked. Instead, it is given to Tom Hanks, who has a shaved nose, a polished plate, and a layer of fake fat on his body. For devoted Hanks fans such as myself, These are perplexing times; see the teaser for Disney's impending "Pinocchio," in which Hanks plays Geppetto with an Einstein wig, a bushy mustache, and, I imagine, yet another nose. This most reliable of performers have decided to hide in camouflage at the moment and focus on manipulating strings, whether they be for evil or good. I didn't murder him, Parker states in one of the several voice-overs. Presley was created by myself. It really is a boy!
How do you make a wish on a star? Simple. Parker puts Elvis on a Ferris wheel and pauses it at the top, showing him all the world's kingdoms like the Devil. Parker enquires, "Are you prepared to fly?" The staging of these sequences is hardly subtle, but as was made clear in "Moulin Rouge!" (2001), Luhrmann prides himself on being unsubtle. Little is half-hidden or unsaid. For instance, a young Elvis may see some dancers through a gap in a shack, writhing and sweating to the lusty howl of the blues; he would then go to a nearby tent, sneak inside, and join a Black revivalist gathering, which would give him the Pentecostal shivers. Although the closeness of the two sites is plainly absurd, Luhrmann may emphasize his thesis by showing how the Presley sound was created amid a double ardor of the holy and profane. You stay silent.
Every chronicle has gaps in unexpected places, just like that. Any fan of Elvis is therefore well-versed in the legend surrounding the late Sun Studio session in July 1954, when Elvis, together with Scotty Moore on lead guitar and Bill Black on bass, were ready to call it a night because they were unhappy with their progress. They took it at a driving yet drumless lick while they messed about with an old song called "That's All Right, Mama." Sam Phillips, the producer, was alerted to the situation by what he was hearing and instructed them to restart. As earthquakes go, it was more powerful because it was so absurdly carefree. Imagine what Robert Altman or Jonathan Demme may have done with such a moment, as it begs to be dramatized. But Luhrmann rarely even glances at it. He likes grandiose set pieces that are extended out rather than cut down. Due to this, he makes room for Elvis' infamous comeback show from 1968, which had him dressed in a suit of black leather, as well as a gigantic piece of pomp from the age of Las Vegas, which saw Elvis glowing in white studded clothing, like a mischievous angel on the loose. The odd thing is that there are existing visual records of both incidents. The first occurred on television and was the most-watched program of the year. The second was immortalized in the 1970 documentary "Elvis: That's The Way It Is." Both are available for streaming whenever you want. Although Luhrmann is making a lot of noise, the thunder is nothing new.
If you take a restroom break in the midst of "Elvis," you can easily miss the movie's fastest section. This montage is devoted to Elvis' least successful period, when, at Parker's encouragement, he traveled to the West to become a movie star. As a result, classic works like "Girls! Girls! Girls!" (1962) and "Clambake" (1967) were produced, and "Elvis" obediently provides his protagonist with a leading man's lament. He says, "I'm so sick of playing Elvis Presley. I'm going to venture a guess that Luhrmann, like other admirers, feels embarrassed by the sight of such doldrums and just wants to get them over with so he may continue sailing. Is he correct?
Not completely. If you go by the money, no. Ignoring Elvis as a commercial machine—both in terms of his ability to make money and of his rumored spending—is the best way to dispel the myth surrounding the man. Analyzing the 1961 box office results and noting that Elvis' "Blue Hawaii" earned more than "Judgment at Nuremberg"—and, in fact, more than "Breakfast at Tiffany's"—will help you gain a better understanding of the America of the era. Who wouldn't believe that the Mississippi Midas, who was raised as an only kid who adored his mother and came from humble beginnings, ended himself here singing along to his ukulele? Elvis' movies serve as a showcase for his manners among other things, and this eager civility is another selling feature. Sparks of joy are all that remain in the movie of the passionate relationship he had with Ann-Margret while they were filming "Viva Las Vegas" (1964). The variety of his paper-thin roles—cowboy, racecar driver, frogman, pilot, or, in "Tickle Me" (1965), a rodeo rider at an all-female ranch—flattens him rather than adds depth, and the shine of the screen makes him look literally airbrushed. For this reason, Andy Warhol used a shot from 1960 Western "Flaming Star," in which Elvis is dressed as a gunslinger, as the inspiration for a series of silvery prints. If his revolver is loaded, it is loaded with blanks and pointed towards us.
All of which is a travesty, a tragedy, and a form of creative death to those who felt the explosive charge of the earlier Elvis. Greil Marcus speaks to "the all-but-complete absorption of a revolutionary musical form into the mainstream of American society, where no one is challenged or intimidated" in his magnificent essay "Elvis: Presliad." The issue is whether Luhrmann's "Elvis" encourages this ongoing process of engulfment or tries to resist it. With the camera refusing to remain steady, the bling-dripping titles, and the Ferris wheel vanishing into the rotating label of a 45, the movie surely has a provocative enough appearance. Luhrmann occasionally cuts the frame up merrily, like someone creating a banana split. What chance is there for rock and roll have given how the movie avoids sex and drugs (we see a rattling handful of tablets, hardly the pharmaceutical candy shop of legend)? Aesthetic mischief, however lively, is not the same as danger.
Austin Butler's portrayal of Elvis, when he approaches the stage's edge at a Memphis baseball and fuels the crowd's enthusiasm, does have a hint of danger. (Parker calls the police because he is so worried.) Butler, with his Hawaii-blue eyes and his compliant lightheartedness of heart, primarily highlights the appeal of the character. However, the ease with which he begins rehearsals at the International Hotel, making nice to his thirty-piece band and to his backing singers, the Sweet Inspirations, sounds gloriously real. I didn't quite believe in the emotions that he pours after his mother passes away. There is nothing wrong with his tickling us.
In other words, Butler belongs at the soft end of the spectrum of actors who have attempted to embody Elvis, far from Kurt Russell in John Carpenter's "Elvis" (1979), or Nicolas Cage in "Honeymoon in Vegas" (1992), who teams up with a group of skydiving Elvis impersonators and whose entire career has been like a set of variations on the theme of Elvis. (Though not for very long, Cage later wed Lisa Marie, Elvis's daughter.) But let's face it: Elvis himself was the first and finest Elvis impersonator. Everyone else who has portrayed him thereafter, whether on screen or in other media, has only contributed another layer to the palimpsest, and thus to the meaning of the man. There isn't a subterranean ur-Elvis. We long to be the people who listened to Dewey Phillips' program on WHBQ in July 1954 to hear the King sing for the first time and see the earth trembling beneath our feet, but we will never be able to travel back in time. That is how things are.
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