Get On Up - James Brown bio-pic

[RobJ]

I finally saw this movie over the weekend and really thought it was a weak effort in general. I found it to be convoluted and confusing with all the back and forth in time scene cuts, lack of character's being defined, so so script, etc. The upside is most of the acting was good to very good.

I've been a JB fan since I was a kid, still have a lot of his work on vinyl, and do know quite a bit about his life. I'm not sure whether that helped or hindered my enjoyment of the movie.

Maybe I missed something but all in all I was left thinking the film wasn't a great tribute to the memory of JB. Mick Jagger got a producer credit, what the Frederick does MJ know about producing movies?

 

[Dutch]

Rob, that's the thing about these bio movies. The more you actually know about the character, the less likely you are to enjoy the movie.

I suppose part of the problem, is that the directors and producers are rushed for time to make the entire presentation fit into a 2 to 3 hour window. To do this, they mesh a lot of true content with fictional content. As usual, they usually feel the need to add the fictional content, in order to make the story or character more interesting.

Oliver Stone did the same thing when he made The Doors. One scene in particular, where Morrison pulls out a kitchen knife, tells his girlfriend to kill him, then takes a duck off the table and proceeds to stomp it into the floor, actually never happened. For some reason, Stone felt it needed to be added to the movie, instead of simply sticking to the facts.

The reality to it is, that most people who are interesting enough to make a movie about to begin with, rarely need fiction added to make a bio more interesting.

Also, not defining specific characters, or sometimes meshing two people into one, keeps the producers from having to pay anyone any royalties.

 

[RobJ]

Perhaps my expectations were too high. I thought Ray and Walk the Line were both very well done and was hoping for a similar quality.