Photograph: Landmark Media/Alamy
When I was first in a cinema earlier this year as the world “opened up”, and saw the trailer for Elvis, I was really blown away by the gyrating hips and “Elvis-fever”. It was someone for who I – as a 90s kid – was not too overly familiar with. He seemed like a mythical beast, for I’d neither grown up with his music. I do recall, however, that the very first encounter I had with Elvis’ music was a cover of his song ‘A Little Less Conversation’ and a 2002 remix by Junkie XL of a later re-recording of the song by Presley became a worldwide hit. Beside that, I’d heard the odd song like ‘Jailhouse Rock’ but nothing was too prominent in his discography due to the lack of exposure.
Having said that, I was blown away by this movie for being able to captivate my attention for a whole 2 hours and 40 mins (a hard task, even for a theatre production with an interval). For instance, the direction by Bad Luhrman – whose Romeo and Juliet, Moulin Rouge are culy classics – was so vividly portrayed. The bright cinematography, along with Austin Butlers’s exquisite performance as ‘The King’ was really commendable.
I left feeling like I’d learned a lot (the history gaps I crave to be filled in when truly going into an epic telling of an extraordinary life), especially in terms of the influence Black music had on Elvis. It made me want to take a plane to Beale Street in Memphis immediately, and visit the club Elvis frequented. It was refreshing, and the way his later life’s turmoils and the pain of fame was sensitively dealt with.
Do not miss this, and let yourself escape the heat in this soaring temperature-clad blip on our “normal island” to enter a room to be told a beautifully shot movie. I just adored it. Let me know what you thought with a tweet @hamzajahanzeb