Watch The Cringey Trailer For ‘Stardust’, The Unauthorised David Bowie Biopic
The trailer has been roasted online - and we can see why.
Given the wild (and controversial) success of Bohemian Rhapsody, it was inevitable that we were going to receive a new swarm of pop biopics. So, like clockwork, today the trailer dropped for Stardust, telling the story of the early life of David Bowie.
Starring Johnny Flynn as Bowie, the film follows the pop giant in the aftermath of the release of his disastrous self-titled album. Largely considered a novelty back then, capable only of writing twinkly jingles, Bowie was far from the titanic cultural figure that he’s considered today, and the film appears to be honest about his setbacks.
What it doesn’t seem to be honest about is, uh, everything else. The trailer is being roundly mocked online, account of… Well, I mean, just watch, and then we’ll talk.
The first thing to note is that Stardust has not been approved by the Bowie estate. Indeed, Bowie’s son Duncan Jones has taken swipes at the project on Twitter. Jones, who is a filmmaker himself, says he would have preferred had Into The Spider-Verse director Peter Ramsay or American Gods scribe Neil Gaiman helmed the project, and turned it into something more than a rote Bohemian Rhapsody rip-off. Which sounds good to me, personally.
If @neilhimself wanted to write something using dad's characters, and @pramsey342 and his team wanted to make it as an animated film, I would urge everyone on my end to pay attention and give the pitch serious consideration. ;) https://t.co/WdpuL1o7z7
— Duncan Jones (@ManMadeMoon) January 31, 2019
Moreover, Jones has long stressed that the film does not have rights to Bowie’s music. That means, as far as anyone can tell at this stage, that there will be none of Bowie’s actual songs in there. Which makes this whole thing even more pointless — a little like telling the story of Picasso without having him pick up a paintbrush.
Anyway, who knows: maybe the thing will actually turn out to be good. It’s never a sensible idea to judge something off a two-minute marketing promo. I’m just saying if it does turn out to work, it’ll have been against the odds.