Heavenly Creatures

“Rocketman” and “Godzilla: King of the Monsters.”

- Anthony Lane

The new bio-pic of Elton John, “Rocketman,” is directed by Dexter Fletcher. Last year, he assumed command of the Freddie Mercury film, “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and steered it to a safe harbor, after the previous director walked the plank. If you need somebody to recount the rise of a British rock god from pallid suburbia to the baroque extremes of fame, and to create a stir without causing too much of a fuss, Fletcher is your man. He is the helmsman of the acceptably outrageous. David Bowie fans, watch out.

“Rocketman” is framed as a therapeutic exercise. We first encounter the adult Elton John (Taron Egerton) as he stomps down a corridor in a tangerine catsuit, tricked out with wings and horns. He looks like Hellboy, only shorter and angrier. Bursting through a door, Elton finds himself in group therapy, and immediately reveals his addictions: sex, drink, and drugs—the usual suspects—plus bags and bags of shopping. “I was actually a very happy child,” he adds, and, with that, we are spirited back to his youth, and thence through his personal past. We get the early gigs in pubs; the meeting with his lifelong lyricist, Bernie Taupin ( Jamie Bell); the doomy arrival of John Reid (Richard Madden), who became Elton’s lover and manager; the globe-straddling glory; and the statutory crackup, without which no rock fable is complete. The whole thing winds up where it began, with the star, effiiently cured of his miseries, embracing his younger self, and carolling “I’m Still Standing.” Job done.