Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody
Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance With Somebody [2022]
Starring: Naomi Ackie, Nafessa Williams, Clarke Peters
Dorection by Kasi Lemmons
Language: English
And here is the third and final installment of my airplane movie watching. This movie first came on my radar in December of 2022, but I never got the chance to watch it because I was on holiday when it was in theatres, and the country I was visiting wasn't showing the film. By the time I got back, the movie had swiftly exited the movie timetables. This flight was my chance. I have been obsessed with Whitney Houston for years, and I thought it was high time that a biopic came out celebrating her life. I don't care what the critics have said, but I loved this movie. And any true Whitney fan would love it too.
Everyone knows Whitney Houston, one of the biggest music stars in the 1980s and 1990s in the US. A figurehead for African-American representation in the music industry, Houston broke all sorts of records to ascend to the top: a space where few African Americans had infiltrated until that point. This movie is Whitney's story, and demonstrates her transition from being a new talent, discovered as a gospel singer, her swift rise to fame, her tortured relationship with Bobby Brown, and her subsequent downfall at his hands.
Let me just say that whoever was in charge of casting did Whitney some JUSTICE. Never have I seen someone so suited for a role than Naomi Ackie is for Whitney Houston. She captured her essence perfectly: all the charm and grace that made America fall in love with Whtiney Houston whilst she was still alive. Her performance was at the same calibre as Jessica Chastain as Tammy Faye, and that role won her an Oscar. What does that tell you about how amazingly I thought Ackie performed in the film? Let's talk about the vocals! There is no Whitney Houston without the voice, and man were the vocals on point! I am not even remotely American, but when Ackie sang the 'Star Spangled Banner' chills rushed down my spine: somehow I felt immensely patriotic for a country that was not my own. And that's what I call the Whitney Houston effect.
That being said, the only negative thing I can really say about the picture was that the pacing was slightly off. Whitney's rise to fame was shown too quickly, where it could have been fleshed out a little more. This contrasts starkly to the second half of the movie, which focuses on a much narrower part of time. It was almost as if the writers couldn't really decide what to include: so they missed some, or included too much. Therefore, certain events didn't have the same level of coverage as others. That was a little bit strange, but I didn't really mind it.
My plan is to watch the biopics of other prominent African American artists: Tina Turner (Tina), Etta James (Cadillac Records), and Aretha Franklin (Respect). Be on the look out for those.
Rating this movie would be to define a movie that touched me so greatly, in a way that very few other films have been able to. So I'll let you figure out how much I liked this.
