Headline : What does a good music biopic actually look like?

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Watching the preview clip of Back To Black, the new Amy Winehouse biopic, it is impossible to shake the image of the late singer watching it herself. Winehouse, someone unafraid to dismiss anything she saw as beneath her, would surely not accept this soft-soap depiction of her rise from jazz singer to international icon. Back To Black isn’t really for Amy Winehouse, though. Just like the flawed 2018 Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody shied away from a full depiction of Freddie Mercury’s sexuality or his hedonistic lifestyle, Back To Black is a film with reputation management at the top of its agenda. That fact that the subjects of these films are unable to object seems as though it must be a bonus for the producers.

Bohemian Rhapsody is starting to feel like ground zero for a new wave of musical biopics that has already brought movies on Elton John, Bob Marley, and Elvis Presley. It’s not that these films are all bad. Some, in fact, have a lot to recommend about them. But it’s beginning to feel like the notoriously lazy Hollywood machine has found a new flavor of IP that it likes. Superhero fatigue is very real, but it appears the hunger for films about musicians is growing. Bob Marley: One Love (43% on Rotten Tomatoes) is on course to make over $200 million at the box office and Back To Black may well follow suit. Maybe those don’t grab your attention but chances are you’ll be interested in at least one of the upcoming movies about Bruce Springsteen, Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan, Michael Jackson, Billy Joel, Boy George, Linda Ronstadt, Carole King, or the Beatles (that’s four movies, one for each member).

It’s not a stretch to imagine studio executives rolling out their slate of biopics in the way Marvel once confidently announced 10 years worth of titles at Comic-con (“Coming in 2030, Harry Styles in Jagger!”). But before we sprint towards another decade of cheap green screen and bad wigs, it’s worth stopping and asking what is behind this trend and what precisely we want from the wave of upcoming titles.

Money being at the heart of commercial decision making is neither revelatory nor necessarily evil. The biopic trend does feel inherently conservative, though, when paired with what is happening in the music industry. The past decade of streaming has placed increased importance on labels back catalogs. Greatest Hits albums dominate the charts and one well-placed Stranger Things sync can send a song like Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill” stratospheric.

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