Michael Movie Review: Moonwalking on Memory

IT IS DIFFICULT to explain how Michael Jackson transformed the world of entertainment. Much like the chameleon-like singer Madonna, he took pop music and made it the song-and-dance spectacle we have come to expect. He branched out on his own, becoming a global star with his breathtaking mix of stunning videos and trademark dancing. The biopic Michael is excellent at recreating the music and the singer’s nephew Jaafar Jackson (in the titular role) is almost his spitting image. However, the movie tells you nothing about what made Michael Jackson the subject of so much controversy later in life; more specifically it says nothing about his alleged paedophilia and drug use.

For anyone who grew up in the 1980s, watching the biopic is like going back in a time machine and reliving the thrill of listening to Bad and Thriller on scratchy tapes and then seeing the dances on bootlegged videos. He was a guilty pleasure, the soulful sound that soothed you when things went wrong. Michael doesn’t do the late singer justice, though its recreation of his music does. And though his music healed us, the movie just reopens old wounds, of fallen angels and disgraced idols.