Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis Biopic Looks Awful
Luhrmann has done great work (Moulin Rouge is one of my all-time favorite movies, not to mention one of the only musicals I’ve ever loved), but this just looks bad. The guy cast as Elvis Presley looks nothing and sounds nothing like Elvis, and if you’re making a biopic about a music star as iconic as Elvis, you better have at least a passing resemblance visually or audibly. I’m not an Elvis stan, but he was gorgeous in his youth—almost baby-faced when he was in his 20s—and this horribly miscast actor (someone named Austin Butler) is definitely not. His face is way too long or something. Tom Hanks sounds and looks like a caricature of something or someone—I’m not sure what. The accent goes from sounding like an elderly European wizard to an Alabama white trash hick. Awful on every level, but maybe all of this weirdness will make sense in the complete film? Luhrmann’s films are always heavy on style, so it might not be translating well in a brief trailer.
Also, whoever cut this trailer for Warner Bros. gave Baz Luhrmann a double writing credit on the screenplay? Seems like no one has any idea what they’re doing on this movie.
