Everybody’s Talking About Jamie (2021)
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Everybody’s Talking About Jamie Movie Review
Everybody’s Talking About Jamie is a 2021 musical drama film directed by Jonathan Butterell and starring Max Harwood. It’s a conventional, but very entertaining flick.
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“Everybody’s talking about the boy
in the dress who was born to express“
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Based on the stage musical of the same name, which itself was based on a real life story, the film follows a gay boy who decides to become a drag queen at the age of sixteen. This is one of those British films done in the vein of ‘Billy Elliot’ where there is a pro-unconventional job narrative in a small town that is unforgiving toward ambition and authenticity.
There is always a question of what is more important – to have a film about an unconventional person also be unconventional and different or to make an entirely predictable, populist take on this authentic figure. This movie entirely belongs in that latter camp, and that is fine if they wanted to inspire their teenage audience and to make a more palatable movie for the wider masses, but still this conventionality led to predictability that was particularly evident in the second half. The first half was much more energetic and memorable.
Max Harwood delivered such a strong performance, praise-worthy for this newcomer. He fitted the role like a glove physically as the real-life Max was similar as shown in the post-credits, thus the movie was given a lot of authenticity through casting. The character is just wonderful. He is inspirational, fun and colorful, but there is a lot of genuine warmth that he exudes in his personality, which made the whole movie more endearing.
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I liked his best friend a lot and the two have a great friendship, but they still continue to promote the wearing of hijab, which is just repulsive to me. Margaret is a wonderful mother and I found their relationship truly moving, but the whole father subplot felt a bit drawn out and the boy’s cluelessness about him was a bit difficult to buy.
The teacher character was also ridiculously strict and unfair toward Jamie to the point that she became a buffoonish villain. But I liked the humanizing of the Dean Paxton character. He wasn’t reduced to just being a bully and that final scene with everybody embracing each other was unrealistic, but sweet and inspiring.
Richard E. Grant is also wonderful as Hugo or Loco Chanelle. I wanted much more of him, but that entire sequence that is a flashback to his drag queen years, the HIV pandemic and the early LGBT rights activism was very important in establishing the differences between that era and the period of today. All of these musical scenes were very artistically put together.
Yes, Everybody’s Talking About Jamie is a musical and a very strong one at that. In fact, I was blown away by the amazing soundtrack. This is a rare musical soundtrack where all songs are at least appealing while at least half are genuinely great. Work of Art is very artistic and cool, Wall in My Head and Spotlight are both super catchy and fun while This Was Me was the best of the bunch with its wonderful eighties-inspired beat.
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The movie was at its best in that energetic, fun and artistic first half, but the second half was just tying up loose ends into a coherent, conventional package. The cinematography, acting and dance choreography are all fantastic, but the direction definitely should have been more elevated.
