Horst_In_Translation Review of Elton John: Rocket Man

Elton John: Rocket Man (2017 Music Video)

A failure, no justice done to the amazing song it includes

[4/10 · 14 May 2019]

If you read "Elton John: Rocket Man", then probably you probably wonder why the year of this one is 2017 despite said song being many decades older. The reason is that this one here was made a long time after the initial release, which is why I am also pretty skeptical in calling this one here a music video. To me it is more of a fan video. For that it looks pretty solid I suppose. The animation sure isn't the problem by any means and that aspect is definitely good enough to be also used for a full feature film. But, yes there is a "but", a really big "but" even, I think the video did not fit the song at all. Of course, "Rocket Man", the song, is also about isolation and loneliness, but probably only 50% of it. The rest is about being hopeful, being dedicated on an important mission and so on. And thiese second 50% do not play a role at all here. I also felt the individual moments did not feel the exact lyrics we hear during this one particularly well. This film clearly relies on the refugee crisis being important enough these days for people to getg an instant liking to itg and see it as a valuable piece of art. In my opinion it is not. The more emotional moments like when he for whatever reason sees an illusion of his family (wife and children) at the subway station made very little sense and had no impact. Maybe this particular scene could have worked better if there had been actual people looking familiar and similar to his loved ones. But no, that was not it. The scene when we see actual rockets and aviation also feel rushed in only with the intention to make at least some precise connection wit the song we hear. Another failure. I read that director Ajin was/is a refugee himself, so with that in mind I really would have expected a more fitting approach on the subject. There is no such thing. I see that neither he nor his co-director McNally have worked on another project since this one was released and scored millions and millions of views on Youtube. Shame the easily influenced fell for it. But maybe they get to know the amazing song featured in here, so at least there is something positive to it all. Don't get me wrong, I really love Elton John's voice in this one, but the latter is not a creative achievement from the filmmakers here. I suppose these under five minutes will get additional attention when the upcoming Ellton John biopic is released. Clearly, they are hoping for similar success and awards recognition like Rami Malek's Freddie Mercury. Somehow I don't see it happening, but we will see. I am still curious about that one. Anyway, my review rocket is drifting too far away from this short film we got here, so to sum it all up let me tell you that this one gets a thumbs-down and negative recommendation. Watch something else instead or just listen to the song. You are not missing much with the video here, I am a bit surprised Elton John himself seemed to have liked this version.