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Velvet Goldmine (1998)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:38
Fresh:21
Rotten:17
Average Rating:6.5/10
Synopsis: Loosely based on the experiences and personalities of David Bowie and Iggy Pop, VELVET GOLDMINE is a wild, glitter-laced trip through the 1970s era of Glam rock. Fictional characters Brian Slade... Loosely based on the experiences and personalities of David Bowie and Iggy Pop, VELVET GOLDMINE is a wild, glitter-laced trip through the 1970s era of Glam rock. Fictional characters Brian Slade (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers) and Curt Wild (Ewan McGregor) are personifications of Glam rock's ideals, with the mysterious and androgynous Slade balanced by the intense, raucous Wild. When Slade disappears, the era itself seems to melt away, swallowed up by the slick 1980s. But Slade's story, and the story of Glam rock, is retold when journalist Arthur Stuart (Christian Bale) is assigned to discover what really happened to Slade. Through his own memories of this time, Arthur faces his childhood fears and fantasies. With a nod to Oscar Wilde, a CITIZEN KANE-like structure, and an overall sumptuous atmosphere, VELVET GOLDMINE is director Todd Haynes's unique look at homosexuality, indulgence, and, most importantly, rock & roll. [More]
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Jonathan Rhys-Myers, Christian Bale, Toni Collette
Starring: Ewan McGregor, Jonathan Rhys-Myers, Christian Bale, Toni Collette, Eddie Izzard, Emily Woof, Michael Feast
Director: Todd Haynes
Director: Todd Haynes
Screenwriter: Todd Haynes
Producer: Christine Vachon
Composer: Carter Burwell
Reviews for Velvet Goldmine
Not a superficial music video but a smart and compassionate dissection of superficiality, and of the alternating joys and disillusionments experienced by its audience.
A strange but ceaselessly fascinating barrage of music and imagery with nothing in the center to hold it all together.
Working slightly against it, it's got an elliptical approach that's initially emotionally disorienting, a plot structure that's been a bit too audaciously borrowed from Citizen Kane, of all things, and a rather vacant performance at [its]center.
Reminisce, if you can, over genderless fashions, boys in makeup and girls in even more makeup. And don't forget those platform shoes, drugs, and glitter, glitter everywhere.
Repeat viewings will allow one to piece together the fragmented montage as a melancholic ode to freedom, and those who fight for it through art.
While some gay men's fantasies center around muscled jocks, cops or cowboys, Todd Haynes' would seem to be of a slightly more arcane bent.
While some gay men's fantasies center around muscled jocks, cops or cowboys, Todd Haynes' would seem to be of a slightly more arcane bent.
This fictionalized story is a thin disguise for David Bowie's bio, and it is a rip-off of the Citizen Kane way of telling a fictionalized biography.
Latest News for Velvet Goldmine
May 26, 2005:
Rhys-Myers and Monaghan Sign up for "MI: 3"
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