Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis: The good, the bad and the ugly of the pop pioneer's story

“Stripping all that away and getting down to who he was as a man, the core of his humanity, that was what fascinated me about it. That’s what really drove me every day.”

Austin Butler as Elvis in Baz Luhrmann’s new film. 

Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis is, by the director’s own admission, not a traditional biopic. Rather than simply telling a story, the famed director (Romeo + Juliet, Moulin Rouge! and The Great Gatsby) says he wanted to emulate Shakespeare’s histories by taking a historical figure and asking: “What can we learn about today?” 

Luhrmann’s film tells the tale of the King of Rock and Roll’s life from humble beginnings in Mississippi, to launching his music career in Memphis in the 1950s, all the way through his electric years of fame to his untimely and tragic death in 1977.