Michael review – cliched Jackson biopic is bland, bowdlerised … and bad (opens in new tab)

Rammed with every music-movie cliche, an almost mute supporting cast and a Michael who only produces endless smiley blandness, this is a frustratingly shallow filmAntoine Fuqua’s demi-biopic of Michael Jackson gives you the chimp, the llama, the giraffe … but not the elephant in the living room. It’s like a 127-minute trailer montage assembling every music-movie cliche you can think of: the producers’ astonishment in the recording studio, the tour bus, the billboard chart ascent, the meeting ...