Bad mistakes? Perhaps the film made a few, but "Bohemian Rhapsody's" star, Rami Malek, came through _ with the lead actor prize at the 91st Academy Awards.
After collecting most of the major prizes on the awards circuit (including the BAFTA, SAG and Golden Globe), Malek was seen as a heavy favorite going into the ceremony. He had transformed himself via prosthetic teeth, trademark mustache and extensive singing and dancing lessons to approximate one of the most revered figures in rock history: Queen's dynamic frontman, Freddie Mercury. But Malek's approach was hardly external-only.
"What I did one day, to really get into his head space, to get some perspective ... 'Ahh. It's right under your nose.' It was by writing out all of his lyrics. I got a window into his soul," Malek told The Times earlier this year.
" 'Can anybody find me somebody to love' comes straight from the gut. Songs like 'Lily of the Valley' or 'You Take My Breath Away,' you write those out and you understand someone who is longing for something so desperately, and that's love and a partner. 'I get ever so lonely from time to time' [from 'You Take My Breath Away']. There are so many references to love and loneliness and living on my own.
"I could start to paint the picture from there of the man behind the frontman. I looked at it as my Freddie Mercury diary. And if you go through the times he wrote them, you can see the evolution of the man."
Even those oversized teeth (Mercury had hyperdontia _ in his case, four extra teeth) were part of Malek's internal transformation:
"I was insecure" with the prosthetic teeth, he told The Times. "At the same time, I found myself elongating my posture to compensate for it. I don't know if that had anything to do with why he was so elegant, but when you are dealt something that might be inhibiting to you, something you get ridiculed for, you tend to overcompensate. And he was very much ridiculed for those teeth. As a kid, he was called 'Bucky' in school."
While Malek's performance garnered near-universal praise, the movie did not. "Bohemian Rhapsody" has earned just 61 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, with critics frequently declaring the film did not rock them.
The Times' Justin Chang echoed the sentiments of many by writing it was "sprawling, jumbled and disappointingly airbrushed ... The irony is that 'Bohemian Rhapsody,' a song that triumphantly bucked convention, should now serve as the title of a movie that embraces every cliche in the days-of-our-lives biopic handbook."
In the same review, he wrote that Malek "hurls himself into his rock-god transformation with a voracious, go-for-broke energy that keeps you watching and, every so often, believing. The five-octave singing voice we hear may be Mercury's ... but the galvanizing star presence and exuberant, hip-slinging bravado are very much the actor's own. Malek is even more persuasive in Freddie's quieter, more conflicted offstage moments, when that voice turns gentler and more cajoling, and he's forced to engage with people beyond" his stage persona.
The film was controversial, as license taken with the band's known history irked fans, and more seriously, scandal enveloped credited director Bryan Singer. Singer was fired, reportedly for frequent absences from the set, and later accused of sexually assaulting an underage boy years ago (Singer has denied the charge). Due to the accusation, BAFTA rescinded Singer's nomination as part of the "Rhapsody" creative team that was up for best British film. GLAAD similarly rescinded its nomination of "Rhapsody" for outstanding film.
Malek said, at a Santa Barbara International Film Festival panel, "My heart goes out to anyone who has to live through anything like what I've heard and what is out there ... I've sat here and talked about how everyone deserves a voice and anyone who wants to talk about what happened with Bryan deserves to have their voice heard ... In my situation with Bryan, it was not pleasant, not at all. And that's about what I can say about it at this point."
Singer was replaced by English actor and director Dexter Fletcher ("Eddie the Eagle"), who has since nearly completed a biopic of Queen's glam-rock rival, Elton John: "Rocketman."
Despite critical misgivings and controversies, the film has been a massive hit among fans declaring they want it all: a nearly $850-million take worldwide, easily the highest-grossing musical biopic ever.
