Stardust

There are many thing wrong with this film. The most obvious one being the failure of the producers to secure the rights to Bowie's music for a film about Bowie's music. The second issue is that the story is in accurate. The film implies that until Bowie invented Ziggy he was a failure in the US until the Spiders from Mars album was out. This is false. Before Ziggy and after TMWSTW Bowie released an album called Hunky Dory which had a US hit called Changes, an FM staple called Life on Mars, and a song that changed rock and roll, called Queen B*tch. The riff of Queen B*tch is maybe the most copied riff since Chuck Berry, especially by punk and new wave bands. So the fact that this film pretends this album never existed to serve some made up story is dishonest

Third mistake is having a 60 year old Marc Marin playing a 39 years old is very distracting.

I came into this with no expectations. I like David Bowie but I'm not a huge fan who knows most let alone all his music. So I wasn't watching this knowing everything about him and his music. But I actually expected some of his music to be in this, similar to Bohemian Rhapsody. This movie was boring and I found myself playing on my phone just waiting for it to end. All in all, I feel like they did a disservice to David Bowie, making him look like an idiot obsessed with becoming famous. They tried to add something deep by adding him being afraid of becoming like his brother, but it actually fell flat. There's a concert scene at the end where he finally goes on stage and the actor had zero sparkle or pizzazz or showmanship where David Bowie on stage had all of this. He literally looked like he was just laying on the stage where he's supposed to be making fierce poses. And I usually like Jena Malone but she had the worst accent in this (and wig and eyebrows) that I just couldn't stand her character. I don't think anyone making this movie recalled that she was American. Curious if the real Angie Bowie had gotten a British accent, I looked her up and she doesn't have one. So why did Jena Malone do the worst British accent in history?

Sure, there's none of Bowie's music here, so if that's why you may want to watch it, don't bother. Once you're past that, it's a pretty engaging little film - Flynn is great (and we all know he really can sing; the Brel stuff is fabulous) and Marc Maron turned in a great performance.

I'm a rabid devotee and aficionado of Bowie. Frankly, I wasn't expectant to see a film of the highest order. I had qualms...and for good reason.

In my estimation to portray David Bowie is a fool's errand. The man was peerless with creative restlessness, panache and flair that no one absolutely no one could touch. Flynn's attempt to show us Bowie onscreen left me cold. He's not cut out to play David Bowie. I was underwhelmed to say the least. Yeah, an awful lot of people claim that he doesn't bear a slightest resemblance to David. To my mind it's not the case. The storytelling is slapdash, film's attempts to unveil the true story failed spectacularly. To crown it all the fact that this freaking film simply overlooked Hunky Dory is unforgivable. What's the hell??? That was a breakout album for Bowie, a step change in his music direction, the time when he recalibrated his sound and vision. I can go on and on.

Having said that, gotta give the devil it's due. The flick gave it a try to shine a light on the more obscure Bowie period. The time when his career was still at an embryonic stage. He tried to make his way as an artist and find his voice at long last.

Some fervent fanatics of the flick can slam me claiming that I'm in no position to criticize. But hey, I have a good mind to voice my opinion. David Bowie means the world to me.

If you wanna get into Bowie, this film is not a step in the right direction. In case you live and breathe Bowie, don't even bother.

David Bowie was a one-off. The mercurial artist was always on the move artistically. He was unafraid to switch gears. Bowie took chances thought his long term-career and seldom let up. Make no mistake his legacy will live indefinitely.

How can you have a David Bowie Biopic, and not have any of his music in the film?