Velvet Goldmine

Todd Haynes, ever unpredictable, follows up his experimental trilogy Poison and his restrained Safe with this flamboyant study in glam rock through the kaleidoscopic lens of Citizen Kane. Christian Bale plays Arthur Stuart, a reporter sent to investigate the legend of rock legend and bisexual pop icon Brian Slade (Jonathan Rhys-Meyers as a not-so-thinly veiled David Bowie), who disappeared a decade ago after staging his own mock assassination. But Arthur is flooded with memories of his own adolescence as he interviews Slade's friends and business associates, peeling back the layer of makeup and spangles that was the model of rebellion for a generation of middle-class British kids and discovering a hollow center. Ewan McGregor almost steals the film as the punk pioneer Curt Wild (equal parts Iggy Pop and Kurt Cobain), the genuine article to Slade's calculated, coifed image of glitter stardom. Haynes's film lacks nothing in capturing the flamboyance and spectacle of the era with flashy filmmaking and kitschy costumes, and if the plot seems lost in the preening and visual fireworks, perhaps that's the point: behind the façades and manufactured fronts is nothing but glitter, energy, and a beat. --Sean Axmaker

Movie Details

Cast: Ewan McGregor, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Christian Bale, Toni Collette, Eddie Izzard, Emily Woof, Michael Feast, Janet McTeer, Mairead McKinley, Luke Morgan Oliver, Osheen Jones, Micko Westmoreland, Damian Suchet, Danny Nutt, Wash Westmoreland
MPAA Rating: R
Running time: 124 min
DVD Aspect Ratios: 1.85:1

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DVD Features:

• Color
• Widescreen
• Closed-captioned

International rating:

Europe: 15
Australia: MA

DVD International release dates:
North America: May 6, 03