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Why Can’t Music Biopics Be Good?


The worst of the genre, ranked.

Music biopics tend to follow the same beats: A sensitive and singular talent too pure for this world wants to create but falls prey to the lure of fame and drugs and a culture of exploitation that the movie usually perpetuates but is uninterested in examining. Once your eyes adjust to the brain-breaking image of shrunken-down writer-director-actress Valérie Lemercier playing a 5-year-old girl, this unsanctioned Céline Dion biopic provides a fascinating recap of the singer’s prodigious talent and career. Marisa Abela, who is so perfect and stannable as Yasmin on Industry, puts on her best “Oy, mista!” voice to play the gone-too-soon icon of the aughts whom the British tabloids very well may have hounded to death.

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