George Michael: Portrait of an Artist

I'm am sorry, but how would a former manager know anything about George when he himself stated they had no deep conversations. All speculation on many of the troubles we knew about. Watch Freedom Uncut. Listen to his last interview. That was his words, his feelings, not speculation. As I said we know of his problems and there is no new insight here because they did not know him. As for the ex, that person lost all credibility for reasons.

Unfortunately I believe the same person that made this is now acting like an expert on another star we recently lost.

If the person making this truly respected George Michael, love his music, and keep speculation out, We know of his troubles, he had enough press harrassing him in life. He does not need it now.

I was a young guy when Wham took off, and the George Michaels solo career followed.

This documentary tells the George Michaels journey from would be pop star into a well respected and extremely talented solo performer.

George starts off his musical career as a teenager full of hopes of conquering the world of pop music. Along with his best friend Andrew Ridgeley, Wham is formed and they explode onto the scene. Slowly but surely the star quality of George starts to burn bright.

Over the years, George turns from a bright eyed enthusiastic pop star into a cynical performer, who seems to be at odds against himself as a reluctant celebrity under the scrutiny of the media. There are insights into his family life and partners.

The story telling is relevant and good in this documentary. They could have touched more on his relationship with Andrew Ridgeley, and also his death was never clearly discussed.

I liked the Wham documentary better, but this is still good, particularly if your a George Michael fan.

.... and not enough people who were actually knew personally George Michael -- where is his family, friends? Instead, you get plenty of Academic Talking Heads from some psyche dept. At some college or university or social-psych centre you've never heard of, who never met George, never talked with him, etc., but, oh, they knew exactly why he did, when he did it, etc.

The filmmakers did manage to find one person who personally worked with George in the control room, mixing and recording the songs, etc. Oh, wow, big whoop!

I am so tired of all these documentaries in the last 10 years (mostly end up on Streaming Services anyway) where people who didn't know the Subject personally just go on and on and on about why Artist did this or did that.

Actually, the best of all the recently released documentaries is the only I saw on Netflix, simply titled "Wham!" because it only deals with the Wham! Years - not George's post-Wham! Days.

In the Netflix docu, there are many interviews with people who actually knew and worked (and sang!) with George! Especially nice to see Andrew Ridgeley, showing us all those scrapbooks his mom made (and kept!) all through the "Wham!" years. It would be cool if some savvy publisher -- or even Andrew's family -- published a fascimile-sized book of all these scrapbooks. What a treat that would be!

Anyway, skip this one (please!) and that other British-TV docu that interviews neighbors et al right after George's death. ("So how did you know George?" "How did you react to his death?" and other inane questions. Lots of required camera shots of all the flowers stacked up by the home's front entance. Blah, blah, blah... Seen it all before, folks!

George Michael (and the seemingly left-behind Andrew Ridgeley) deserve better.

The reality of this "documentary" is that it is in a lot of respects lazy like most documentaries these days. They are just outsiders and fringe people giving one on one quotes that don't really involve the person. The really thing that irked me was that he was like Bill Gates and wanted to give away all of the money that he earned. He is not like Bill Gates. Bill Gates isn't giving away any of his money, he's established a not for profit that will hold all of his money and grow it. That is what is whole third world country "health" business is about, growing his business and wealth for future generations. 10 Billion invested into vaccines turned into 200 Billion. Bill Gates is not giving away anything.

Being the same vintage as George Michael, and knowing about the music that was the soundtrack to my young adulthood, I expected to like this trip down memory lane.

But it was very much more than that. It was a look at the backstory that explained everything about the arc of George's life and career, and the darkness you could always tell was around the edges.

I had forgotten how influential his coming out was. And I was unaware of his deliberate political provocations. I was also completely unaware of this philanthropic nature and the deliberateness of that as well.

I'm sorry that the demons won that battle for his existence--he's someone we could really count on right now in our current battles with the other demons that have been unleashed lately.

I am going to be thinking about this for a long time. It's not a story I'll be able to shake off. I'm glad I watched.