Saturday, January 17, 2015

Did Angela Bassett miss the mark? A few thoughts on the Whitney Houston movie

I am a HUGE Whitney Houston fan. In fact I often think of her as a friend in my head and instead of calling her by stage name, I call her Nippy just like her friends and family did. That's how familiar I was with her even though I had never met her a day in my life. Crazy? Maybe. But I am a true die-hard fan.

So imagine how excited I was about the idea of a Lifetime biopic centered around Nippy and wait for it....being directed by the one and only (Yale educated) Angela Bassett. I was STOKED. Even though this was Angela's directorial debut I still had very high hopes, how could you doubt such a legend? She seems to know what she's doing in front of the camera so surely directing a film about her friend shouldn't be too much of a stretch right? And did you see the way she transformed into Tina Turner? She knows a thing or two about morphing into character, I was sold.


The movie aired tonight on Lifetime and I am still really trying to digest all of what I saw. To be honest with you, the two hour film should have been called the Bobby Brown movie instead of the Whitney movie. The story line followed their romance and attempted to show a more sensitive, loving and kind side of the "king of R&B".
Bobby and Whitney 

 You guys, in one excruciatingly painful scene from the movie, Bobby is approached by a groupie while Whitney is just a few feet away and he rebuffs her advances. WHAT? Bobby Brown turning down booty? Stop that right now. I am not saying that the 45 year old singer was all bad but he certainly was no angel, Nippy spoke about his antics in detail to Oprah, remember this? To be fair, towards the end of the movie there is a scene in which Whitney walks in one Bobby having sex with another woman. Can you imagine what she felt seeing her hubby laid out with the next chick? Aww hell no!

The other tidbit I learned was that 56 year old Miss Bassett is a bit of a freak. This love scene was the raciest scene I have seen on cable in a long time. I mean just look at these pics!

Whoa! 

Whoa! 

Whoa!
Here's the video:

One thing the movie nailed was the costumes. Whoever was in charge of wardrobe should get a raise. Perfection!





Yaya Decosta who played the title character was also amazing tonight, She really did her best to capture the energy of Nippy. From the way she spoke in a rather rapid manner, to her onstage mannerisms, Yaya did her best to capture Nippy's essence.  "There was a lot of pressure to keep it real and not be offensive. This is a real person who really lived that everybody knows and loves". Yaya can breathe easy now, I would give her an 8.5 out of 10, The lip syncing was a bit off sometimes but other than, a solid performance. And of course with Deborah Cox blessing us with the vocals, that makes for a winning recipe. No one can quite match Nippy's voice but Deborah came pretty close.

Overall the movie was fun to watch. The acting, directing, costume design and cinematography was on point. What wasn't on fleek was how the movie centered a lot of it's story line on Bobby- he's still alive and he can tell his story. I could care less about him. We want to know about our fallen star. Did she have a lesbian relationship with her BFF Robyn? The movie just glossed over that. When did Ray J come into the picture? Did Whitney date after the divorce? How bad did things really get? So many unanswered questions, I almost certain there will be a part two. Well done to Angela Bassett and her team, way to shut up the critics and of course Nippy's messy MESSY family. They filmed a reality show just months after she died, they certainly can have nothing to say about a movie that premiered tonight in 2015, almost three years after her death!

Did you watch the movie? What did you think?

P.S this tweet cracked me up


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