A couple months ago I watched the film, Elvis and I have some thoughts. I want to start by saying that I think all the actors, especially Austin Butler, did a great job. However, the movie felt like one big edit where most of the scenes were shown so that they could be made into tik tok edits. I also felt that this movie also acted as Elvis’s apology(or should i say excuses) video of his problematic pass. If you didn't know Elvis practically stole his entire persona and iconic songs from black artists at the time. In the movie, they acknowledge this by having a black character that is supposed to be his friend by saying that if Elvis acted like the black performer then he would be the only person to make this type of music popular. The way the movie made it seem was like that Elvis got permission to culture appropriate. I also want to mention the soundtrack of this movie. Besides the Elvis songs, most of the artists that made were featured were black artist, that are part of R&B or Rap. Some of these artists were Jazmine Sullivan, Swae Lee, Nardo Wick, Shonka Dukureh, Yola, Denzel Curry, PlayThatBoitZay, Lanesha Randolph and Doja Cat. I just feel that they added a lot of Black artists to show to be like,Hey look Elvis wasn’t racist cuz their in his biopic. Another reason why I think they did it is because some of these songs didn’t match the vibe or era of the time the Elvis was in. But maybe they wanted to modernize Elvis. Hound Dog was a song originally sang by a black woman named Ellie Mae, 4yrs b4 Elvis took it and made it popular. I feel that they tried to excuse this by having Doja Cat, popular black woman artist, cover and put her own twist on it so it could look like a black woman reclaimed the song. I also feel in Doja Cat’s MV, they put lighting on the people in the video to make them look darker, but that could just be me. Another problematic part of Elvis is the fact that he groomed his Wife, Priscila. They met when she was 14 and he was 24 year old. The movie does this weird thing of not really talking about their relationship in depth but painting it as if it was some teenage, high school, young love that fizzled out cuz of Elvis work. In reality, he most likely got bored of her and ended up cheating on her. I almost forgot there is one scene where it shows Martin L. King death and all Elvis said was “he was a great man”. The Movie is also weird because it’s narrated by Elvis's shady Manager and he talks about how he made Elvis who he was. It kind of creates this feeling that the audience is supposed to feel bad for Elvis, which I guess I could sympathize cuz he was overworked. However, I think that was the reason for this movie cuz now in the era of cancel culture, they were trying to give Elvis a redemption arc. I’ve also heard that they might be doing another movie about Elvis but w/Jacob Elordi based on Priscilla’s Pov. I also think it’s weird how Priscilla seems to be always hangin on the arm of Austin at events, It’s like she kind of believes Austin is Elvis which is a little odd.
