Stardust
Ratings: 3.9/5
Duration: 1hr 49 mins
Language: English
Genre: Drama, Biography
Director: Gabriel Range
Writer: Christopher Bell, Gabriel Range
Producer: Kirsty Bell, Ian Berg, Matt Code, Christopher Figg, Nick Taussig, Saskia Thomas, Paul Van Carter, Fabien Westerhoff, Robert Whitehouse, Annabel Wigoder
Music: Anne Nikitin
Cinematography: Nicholas D. Knowland
Editing: Chris Gill
Art Direction: Alder Dunlap
Release Date: 27 November 2020
Released In: Theatres
Star Cast: Johnny Flynn, Marc Maron, Jena Malone, Derek Moran, Anthony Flanagan, Julian Richings, Aaron Poole, Monica Parker, Ryan Blakely, Gord Rand, Paulino Nunes, Richard Clarkin, Brendan J. Rowland, Jeremy Legat, Annie Briggs, Olivia Carruthers, Geoffrey McGivern, Lara Heller, Martin Askew, Dylan Roberts, Oliver Becker, James Cade, David Huband, Jorja Cadence
Plot:
Stardust will chronicle the young David Bowie's first visit to the US in 1971, a trip that inspired the invention of his iconic alter ego Ziggy Stardust.
Review:
The movie ‘Stardust’, a David Bowie origin story is finally released seven months after its scheduled premiere at the cancelled Tribeca Film Festival.
Stardust follows a 24-year-old Bowie on a promotional tour through the United States in 1971, accompanied by a long-suffering Mercury Records publicist named Ron Oberman.
Johnny Flynn plays Bowie, Marc Maron plays Oberman, and the point of director and cowriter Gabriel Range’s film is to trace the starting point of Bowie’s breakthrough character, Ziggy Stardust. The publicist searched for any rock journalists or radio stations who might be interested, and the would-be star tried to figure out how to present himself without alienating or boring people.
It is a coming-of-age story, you one might say, except that the guy who comes of age starts as a shy British singer and ends up as a rock star space alien.
Christopher Bell and Gabriel Range’s ‘Stardust’ is set during a crucial moment in Bowie’s career. The narrative loses heat as it proceeds.
The movie presents that Bowie’s half-brother Terry Burns’ (Derek Moran) therapeutic treatment inspired Bowie to perform as other personas, but by that point in his life, the musician had already studied theatre and mime. The film tries to establish that this is that ‘eureka’ moment that led to the idea of playing different characters on stage; thus, offering little basis in reality.
What is true is that Bowie really did crash land at the Oberman’s family home in Silver Springs, Maryland, in 1971. “David Bowie, this is my mother,” Oberman says as he picks the artist up at the airport, leading him not to the nice black car but the green family vehicle parked in front of it. It is one of those rarely funny moments between Maron and Flynn.
Flynn does a good job with Bowie’s voice, both when he is speaking and singing, and he’s got Bowie’s hair circa 1971, Bowie’s teeth (prosthetics) and Bowie’s wardrobe. But he never really makes a total convincing Bowie!
Stardust builds to a few expected twists, from Bowie and Ron’s evolving relationship to some shocking revelations about Bowie’s family life, building up on the subject of colourful life of Bowie.
