What's Love Got to Do With It?

 

What’s Love Got to Do with It? 1993

• Director: Brian Gibson
• Seen by this director: Still Crazy
• Based on the book by Tina Turner
• Cast: Angela Bassett, Laurence Fishburne, Vanessa Bell Calloway, Jennifer Lewis, Phyllis Yvonne Stickney
• Personal “oh yeah him/her” reaction, i.e. have seen this actor in:
• Angela Bassett – Black Panther Wakanda Forever, Black Panther, London Has Fallen, Akeelah and the Bee, Music of the Heart, Contact, Strange Days, Malcolm X, Boyz n the Hood
• Laurence Fishburne – Passengers, Man of Steel, Contagion, Bobby, Akeelah and the Bee, Matrix x 3, Mystic River, Othello, Boyz n the Hood, The Colour Purple, Apocalypse Now
• Vanessa Bell Calloway  - Lakeview Terrace
• Why? Tina
• Seen: Once before. Now 7 November 2023           

             Having seen and loved the musical Tina in London this past week and with a continuing sense of loss over her recent death, it’s time to see this film again.

       If you don’t know the story of Ike and Tina Turner, Google it, or better yet, read her book. If you don’t know Tina Turner’s music, by all means listen to it. Again and again.

       The film is based on Tina Turner’s autobiography. It’s not a pretty picture. It’s harrowing, heart-breaking. Tina deserved so much better and though the film ends on a high note, and we know that after years of struggle, her career exploded, and she had happiness in her private life as well. The film ends before that.

       Bassett and Fishburne are stellar as Tina and Ike. The musical in London was lovely. This film is fantastic. I saw Tina Turner in concert in Stockholm on her Farewell Tour, and there are no words.

       Tina. Always.

 5* of 5