Bohemian Rhapsody, Ray, What’s Love Got to Do With It, or Walk The Line, Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody is not. Kasi Lemmons’s (Harriet, Talk to Me) is not even on the same level as this year’s disappointing Elvis. Naomi Ackie (Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Lady Macbeth) did not encompass the legendary Whitney Houston nearly as well as Rami Malek (Bohemian Rhapsody), Jamie Foxx (Ray), Joaquin Phoenix (Walk the Line), Angela Bassett (Angela Bassett) or Angela Bassett (Elvis). Under the right direction and with the right lead, Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody should have at least been a lock for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role. But, alas, it wasn’t meant to be.
In a year of highly original and innovative movies (including the Elvis mentioned above), Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody felt flat and uninspired. Much of this had to do with the story not revealing much we didn’t already know or at least have some perception. The film chronicles the story of Houston, dating back to 1983 when, at age 20, her mother Cissy (Tamara Tunie – Flight, The Devil’s Advocate) is overly harsh on her as Whitney hopes to sing in her church’s choir. In addition, her father, John (Clarke Peters – Da 5 Bloods, HBO’s The Wire), who later capitalizes on his daughter’s success by making himself her manager and abusing his position up to her death, has equally demanding expectations for Whitney and her two brothers.
Set to perform in the evening, Cissy notices renowned record producer Clive Davis (Stanley Tucci – The King’s Man, Spotlight) in the audience. She pretends to lose her voice to convince Whitney that she needs to go on stage to perform her song “The Greatest Love of All,” to which Davis and the audience are in awe. Whitney soon embarks on her career.
Two parts of Whitney’s story were somewhat new to me. The first was Whitney’s 20+ year romantic relationship with best friend Robyn Crawford (Nafessa Williams – Black and Blue, CW’s Black Lightning), on which she was forced to conceal and eventually abandon on account that a same-sex relationship would ruin her career. The second was that Bobby Brown (Ashton Sanders – Moonlight, Native Son), whom Houston met at the 1989 Soul Train Music Awards, married three years later, and divorced in 2007, wasn’t solely responsible for Whitney’s downfall. The film did not fully portray him as the monster the public made him out to be, and I’m not sure why. Neither Brown’s physical abuse nor Houston’s drug use was visually displayed. This was likely due to wanting to keep the film rated PG-13. Most of us know that Houston could never escape her drug addiction before her death. However, Lemmons shied away from all of this. It changed the overall narrative of the story. While it resonated with audiences (92%), it felt flat with critics (42%), with Roger Ebert’s website review going so far as to call it “an inarticulate, slapdash musical biopic about the famed songstress.”
Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody felt like a made-for-television movie rather than a big-budget box office release. When compared to successful biopics (a few of which were referenced in this review), the film cowers away. I wanted to see something bold or ambitious. As her career advanced, I wanted to see how bad things got for the best-selling black artist of all time. Instead, we got a fluff piece that didn’t distinguish itself from other successful biopics.
Plot 5/10
Character Development 6/10
Character Chemistry 6/10
Acting 6/10
Screenplay 5/10
Directing 5/10
Cinematography 7/10
Sound 9/10
Hook and Reel 5/10
Universal Relevance 7/10
61%
Movies You Might Like If You Liked This Movie
- Respect
- Elvis
- Ray
- Bohemian Rhapsody
- The Bodyguard