We Just Saw Exclusive Footage From The Michael Jackson Biopic, And It Left Me With A Major Concern
Legendary director Antoine Fuqua and the producers that brought you 'Bohemian Rhapsody' are back with another huge musical biopic, 'Michael,' a story spanning decades in the life and career of Michael Jackson. We became some of the first people in the world to see the trailer for 'Michael' at CinemaCon 2024, and there's a lot to discuss. Watch CinemaBlend's Managing Editor Sean O'Connell break it all down.
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00:00 I'm starting with the man in the mirror,
00:02 and I'm asking him to describe the footage from Michael.
00:05 Come on.
00:08 Isn't that great?
00:09 Hey, guys, it's Sean O'Connell,
00:14 the managing editor at CinemaBlend.
00:15 And as you can tell behind me,
00:17 I am in Las Vegas for CinemaCon 2024,
00:19 where all of the studios bring their presentations
00:22 of upcoming films.
00:23 And at Lionsgate, we learned about a huge musical biopic
00:26 that's coming based on the life of Michael Jackson.
00:29 It looks like it's going to follow the formula
00:31 of most biopics,
00:32 and it comes to us from producer Graham King,
00:35 who had previously worked on "Bohemian Rhapsody."
00:37 Of course, when you touch on Michael Jackson,
00:39 one of the things I found really interesting
00:40 is that Graham King admits
00:42 that there's an incredible amount of material
00:43 for him to discuss as part of the singer-songwriter's life.
00:46 And from the footage that we got to see
00:48 in "Caesars" as part of Michael,
00:50 we do go all the way back to Michael Jackson's roots
00:54 as a young kid,
00:55 and then him actually going out on tour
00:57 to start his musical career with the Jackson 5.
01:00 So we're going to be covering, like I said,
01:02 an incredible amount of material
01:04 in the life of arguably one of the most famous musicians
01:07 on the planet.
01:08 A lot of the footage that we saw
01:09 focused on the timeframe of Michael Jackson's life,
01:11 where he's going to be played by Jafar Jackson,
01:13 and it's Michael Jackson at the time of his greatest hits.
01:16 "Man in the Mirror," "Bad," "The Way You Make Me Feel."
01:20 Again, so many hits that you need to touch on,
01:22 and it seemed like the footage that we saw
01:24 is going to go through a montage of it.
01:26 My biggest concern is how much of the time of the film
01:30 are you going to spend in each of these time periods?
01:33 You could arguably do a Michael Jackson film
01:36 that touches only on the '70s,
01:38 only on the '80s, only on the '90s.
01:40 And what Graham King said from the stage
01:42 that I really want to see what Michael does is,
01:45 he admitted the fact that there is a lot of controversy
01:48 for Michael Jackson's life offstage.
01:49 So while you want to celebrate everything
01:51 that he might've done as an artist onstage,
01:54 how much of the film is going to get into
01:56 some of the truly bizarre stories
01:58 that we heard about Michael Jackson offstage?
02:00 And he claimed the fact that the movie
02:02 is going to get into a lot of it,
02:04 and kind of emphasized that this is going to have to be
02:07 a long movie in order to pull that off.
02:09 There was at least some part of the footage
02:10 that was included that makes me believe
02:12 they are going to get into some of the darker sides
02:13 of Michael Jackson.
02:15 We saw brief shots of him taking pills,
02:17 and there's at least one sequence
02:18 that shows him being rushed off to the hospital on a gurney.
02:22 And we do know that there are different instances
02:25 of Michael Jackson having to go to the hospital
02:27 over the course of his career.
02:28 So I do want to find out what they're going to dwell on,
02:31 what they're going to dig into,
02:32 and which parts of that aspect of his career
02:35 are going to get focused on.
02:37 The footage that we saw was really only
02:38 from half of the shoot,
02:40 because director Antoine Fuqua,
02:41 who you know from "Training Day"
02:43 and plenty of other films that he's done
02:44 with Denzel Washington,
02:45 is only halfway through the shoot.
02:47 Michael's going to come out in 2025.
02:49 It's going to be a big emphasis for Lionsgate
02:51 going into next year.
02:52 I think it's tantalizing to talk about
02:54 doing a musical biopic about Michael Jackson.
02:56 There's plenty of stuff for you to get to.
02:58 The footage, again, to sort of emphasize,
03:00 looked like it's following a bit of a boilerplate
03:03 that comes with doing any kind of musical artist
03:06 for a musical biopic.
03:07 But when it's Michael Jackson,
03:08 it's going to have to be something different.
03:10 The footage had a ton of energy
03:13 and really captured what made Michael Jackson
03:16 unique and special when he was performing live.
03:18 And Jafar Jackson looks like he is nailing
03:20 all of the physical aspects
03:22 that come with performing as Michael Jackson.
03:24 The dance, the very strict choreography
03:27 that comes with being part of Michael Jackson's routine,
03:29 all of that is there.
03:31 I'm just really curious about how much
03:33 that when you get Coleman Domingo
03:34 and you get Nia Long,
03:36 are you going to let them explore
03:37 some of the more complicated aspects
03:38 of the Jackson family
03:40 and of Michael Jackson's life in particular?
03:42 Based on what I saw,
03:42 I really do hope that they go into that route,
03:45 but this should be a warts and all biopic
03:47 if it's going to maybe potentially contend for awards
03:50 the way that a lot of actors
03:51 who go out for musical biopics
03:52 do end up being a part of that conversation.
03:55 Lionsgate ended their panel with Michael,
03:57 so it means it's going to be
03:57 a very important film for them.
03:59 It even came after "Ballerina,"
04:01 which is going to be a big film for them in 2025.
04:03 So we've got Michael circled on our calendar.
04:05 Being a huge Michael Jackson fan myself,
04:07 I'm really curious to see how he's portrayed
04:09 and whether audiences are going to respond to it.
04:11 So be on the lookout for that Michael footage
04:13 if and when it makes its way online.
04:15 We are going to be reporting live from CinemaCon all week,
04:17 so keep it right here on CinemaBlend
04:19 for the latest movie news.
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