has Hollywood gone too far with these biopics?

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Edited by Israh S.

SOURCES
Star Adaptations: Queen Biopics of the 1930s by Deborah Cartmell
A companion to the historical film by Robert Rosenstone
“Whose lives are they anyway?: the biopic as contemporary film genre by Dennis Bingham

https://www.nfi.edu/biopic/
https://knight-wire.com/2019/10/17/biopic-films-gain-popularity-a-closer-look-into-why-the-films-are-becoming-so-common/
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-hollywood-is-more-hooked-on-biopics-than-ever-2018-02-12
https://www.vulture.com/2017/11/biopics-oscar-race-i-tonya-darkest-hour.html
https://www.vulture.com/2015/02/stop-making-so-many-biopics.html
https://www.vulture.com/2018/04/why-hollywood-is-suddenly-hot-for-biopics-on-living-people.html
https://variety.com/2021/film/awards/looking-at-how-oscar-proves-bullish-for-biopics-belfast-king-richard-gucci-1235139773/
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/feb/01/rocketmen-and-stardust-why-music-biopics-dominate-the-film-industry
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/26/briefing/nostalgia-oscars-mardi-gras.html
https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20210114-why-biopics-go-so-wrong
https://www.npr.org/2017/12/08/569387687/i-tonya-offers-a-sympathetic-second-act-to-a-disgraced-figure-skater
https://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/house-of-gucci/
https://variety.com/2021/film/news/gucci-family-statement-house-of-gucci-ridley-scott-1235121226/
https://time.com/4172673/true-crime-allure/
https://www.mtv.com/news/3134857/tiktok-has-a-ted-bundy-problem/

intro – 0:00
the history of the biopic – 4:20
the appeal of the biopic – 14:10
the role of true crime – 29:02

22 Replies to “has Hollywood gone too far with these biopics?”

  1. the way film treats writers is so funny to me, like i don't blame mina but we just don't know who writes so many movies and don't think to look it up, we just focus on the directors so much

  2. This rant on Hollywood being unoriginal has always been there. My grandfather couldn’t stand westerns, I loath superhero flicks. Atleast there is a bigger variety of movie genres at your disposal today.

  3. The Elvis movie literally felt like I was watching a 2h long trailer for the Elvis movie

  4. Knowing Mina Le has seen Hunger is wild to me for some reason

  5. ykw is the funniest thing? we can empathise with women who were wronged in the past and realise that they didn’t deserve to be ridiculed by the public and media 10 years ago but we still continue to mock and harass famous women today when it’s popular on tiktok and youtube. i’m looking at you johnny depp stans

  6. I can’t wait for the Mina Le biopic coming out 50 years from now starring Scarlet Johansson’s clone as Mina.

  7. It’s disgusting that they are making a biopic about Gabbie Patito already. Her family is still grieving and that story does not need to be told in that way. They need to let peoples stories remain their own unless the people/families are on board with it. Like I know Elvis’ daughter was on board with Elvis and Austin Butler playing her dad. But I’m the case of Pamela Anderson and so many others it’s heartbreaking to see their stories get told without their consent. And that legally the stories are allowed to be told is fucked up. People should legally own the rights to their own lives and stories

  8. As problematic and messy as his work is I am a fan of some Ryan Murphy projects- I was a long time fan of American horror story and I’ve made these detailed illustration posters of 9 of the seasons (I didn’t do double feature because it didn’t deserve it) and then I saw American crime story.
    I was immediately inspired for the assassination of Versace on how to make a poster out of it. I even had a caption for it which nearly never happens. But as excited as I was for it as a project off the back of what was just a pretty and well performed season of tv I enjoyed… I realised these aren’t fictional characters. No one cares if I draw witches or ghosts but I would have felt really weird drawing real life murder victims and a real life murderer. And so that human side said no the maybe 100 likes on instagram you might get for this drawing isn’t worth the ethics of this.
    And incidentally I don’t always get how people take these events that are tragedies to still living relatives who lost lives ones and make it into art.

  9. A biopic not mentioned that was a really great movie and an amazing performance is Ray (2004) with Jamie Foxx playing Ray Charles. I don’t remember seeing a real-life person being portrayed as well as Jamie Foxx does, sometimes it hard to tell if a clip is Foxx or Charles.

  10. I'm bored with biopics as a whole. There's the occasional interesting story, but overall I think they are way over done and I wish so hard we could start moving away from deifying celebrities and notable people. No one is a deity here. Also, you talked about documentaries telling the true story and that's not always the case. Documentarians (like bad scientists) can still cherry-pick the bits they want to tell about the story they're portraying, so I would always, always go in with a grain of salt for any documentary. They're made to tug on heartstrings (in a positive or negative way), even if the information is crucial in this world.

  11. I think regurgitated stories are a guaranteed return on investment instead of risking money on new narratives that could flop
    The entertainment industry is still a business so the goal is profit not creative originality

  12. Some directors, writers, producers, etc, take creative liberties that I just can't wrap my head around. For example, in Spencer, there are fantastical depictions of Diana's ed. During the movie, I had to google Diana's mental health because I thought that maybe she was having weird hallucinations. They also gave her a lady in waiting that was in love with her. Both of these were just creative choices but it felt super weird that they would just make up parts of this person's life.

    Edit: I think that if the biopic is supposed to be a parody or romanticizing then it's totally fine to take creative liberties. But if it's a serious depiction of the person's life with some random additions it seems more self-satisfying than actually telling a story or paying homage.

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