I went to see Bohemian Rhapsody yesterday. I’m conflicted. I really enjoyed the performances and the live scenes were top-notch; the final Live Aid performance was an amazing piece of (mostly digital) film making. However, there are major problems with history in this film that I’m having trouble letting slide. I can forgive them making up how Freddie joined the group, for the sake of brevity, but things like how the band broke up and didn’t play or talk to each other for two years until right before Live Aid, when the truth is they had just finished up their The Works Tour just two months before Live Aid. It makes for a great story, but it stretches the truth pretty hard. And there was a stylistic choice early on that just didn’t make any sense - when they get their first American tour, there is a montage of road scenes and concert performances over which plays, Fat Bottom Girls, which didn’t come out until Jazz in '78, their seventh album.
My other complaint is that it is rated PG-13. How do you tell a decent rock-n-roll story PG-13? You don’t, that’s how. They should have gone fore a little more grit and realism. There’s one obligatory F-bomb, and beyond that, you’ll be able to watch it on ABC’s movie of the week with no edits.