TELLURIDE – Unless you have lived a significant portion of your life outside of the United States or Canada, chances are the name Robbie Williams has no cultural significance for you. Maybe you remember hearing the one hit U.S. single his boy band, Take That, had in 1995, “Back for Good” (or recognize it from walking the aisles of your local drugstore). For the rest of the world, Robbie Williams is pop music royalty. He has reportedly sold 75 million records over the past three decades and packed arenas and stadiums across the globe. His tumultuous career – which is far from over – is revisited in a movie musical with a twist, Michael Gracey’s “Better Man,” which debuted this weekend at the 2024 Telluride Film Festival. And don’t worry about spoilers, the twist is a creative one and happens immediately.
From his first appearance as an 8-year-old getting crapped on by his schoolmates, Williams is portrayed as a monkey. Everyone else in the movie is, effectively real-life human beings, but, yes, Williams is portrayed as a monkey like an actor who just walked off the digital set of any recent “Planet of the Apes” movie. This aesthetic choice is to represent Williams’ belief, shared over conversations with Gracey, that when he walks on stage he’s primarily a monkey for the audience’s entertainment. And yet, even as a child, he is shown basking in the spotlight of entertaining those around him. And as his father says as they watch Frank Sinatra sing “My Way,” you’re either born with it or you’re not. Based on everything since, we certainly know Williams was born with it. His story to fame and glory, is regrettably a familiar one.
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Williams grew up in the U.K. in a small working-class city, Stoke-on-Trent. If you’re a fan of Williams and know a lot about his early life, how he joined Take That, the ups and downs of his solo career, etc. you may want to prepare yourself. A lot has been changed, omitted, or skirted over for this particular movie’s sake. And, hey, it’s not a documentary, so hitting the major historical beats works, right? Oh, wait there is a 2023 Netflix docuseries starring Williams currently available that contradicts several plot points. Well, creative license, hasn’t stopped biopics before.
Everyone’s life is their own to experience and endure, but Williams’ has several familiar storylines that often occur in the life of a music industry star. Idealistic pop protege joins a boy band, in this case, Take That, who learns the ropes but is frustrated not getting to do their own thing. After a few years, it’s time to go solo. While struggling to match his boy band era success, his romantic life picks up. He has a chance encounter with Nicole Appleton (Raechelle Banno), a member of the popular UK girl group All Saints, during a yacht party. Their love is firey and romantic, and they get engaged. But as Williams states in a voiceover that permeates throughout the movie, he would have been an addict even if he’d never gone into the music business. Success sped up the process, and Appleton justifiably has no patience for it.
After finding that one producer who allows him to express his songwriting (in this case, Guy Chambers played by Tom Budge) his solo dreams come to fruition. Expectedly, the bigger he gets, the more he finds himself under pressure to stay on top, and his addictions hit full throttle. Williams’ drug problems are so bad the question becomes: will he hit rock bottom before or after he performs in front of 125,000 fans at the iconic Knebworth venue? A milestone that would match the success of the rock band Oasis, who he’s admittedly jealous of and competitive with (to be fair, the two actors who cameo as Liam and Noel Gallagher, Leo Harvey-Elledge and Chris Gun, are spot on).
Williams’ problems are exacerbated by his strained relationship with his father, Peter (Steve Pemberton), who had lofty music dreams of his own (does this sound familiar?). Peter abandoned Robbie when he was a kid to pursue those dreams, only popping back into his son’s life when he was forced to or when his kid hit the big time. Coming to terms with his father may be the most important decision Williams makes (well, in this movie, at least).
As the screenplay, written by Gracey, Oliver Cole, and Simon Gleeson, unfurls predictably, the musical numbers do not. Many may have written “The Greatest Showman” off as a one-hit wonder for Gracey and given the songwriters and stars of that word-of-mouth blockbuster too much credit. With “Better Man,” Gracey proves he’s a visionary when it comes to crafting an engaging and, perhaps most importantly, surprising musical number.
“Better Man” is essentially a jukebox musical, mostly featuring songs from Williams’ catalog even for the Take That sequences. One lengthy number finds the band dancing through the streets of London’s SoHo neighborhood to his 2000 hit “Rock DJ.” Sure, a plethora of visual effects are used to pull it off, but from the choreography to the cinematography to the production design to the visual framing, the number is an absolute knockout. It’s almost euphoric. And it’s not the only one.
While the musical elements often take the movie to impressive artistic heights, it’s not just the storyline that ends up hindering “Better Man.” In theory, the idea to portray Williams as a CG monkey (physically captured by Jonno Davies and Williams himself as an adult), is a creative masterstroke. Perhaps for a short film or music video, this thematic choice would have a greater impact. As this 134-minute film unfolds, you simply tire of experiencing Williams being portrayed in this context. The visual effects work from WETA are superb, but the human element is increasingly absent. At some point during the film you just want the monkey to transform into the real Williams or an actor portraying him. You want someone real to bring Williams’ life story back to earth. Moreover, in the context of the film, the musical numbers would have been just as stellar without the monkey, perhaps even more so. It was a gutsy and admirable choice from Gracey to go in this direction, but it eventually just leaves you wanting. [C+]
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