John Carpenter fans focus on his horror/sci fi/action output but he always said it was making this that made him a real director - although a TV movie it was a delux one, involving lots of locations, sets and jumps in time. It's an affectionate, loving recreation of Elvis' life with Kurt Russell very strong in the title role. Shelley Winters offers some old time star power/ham as his ma, and it's fun to see various actors from Grease in it, like Crater Face as a bigot who wants to give Elvis a haircut, and Potzy who plays Nick Adams. Joe Mantegna is in this!
Red West is given very very sympathetic treatment. So too Priscilla (played by Kurt Russell's wife IRL). This isn't surprising.
This is an enjoyable tale. I did find myself tuning out from time to time - it's very long. We see a bit of Tom Parker and the movies. There's cute stuff like Elvis on a date with Natalie Wood. I always remembered the ending with him singing 'Glory Glory Hallelujah'. Carpenter does a fine job.
No comments:
Post a Comment