《Michael》试图把迈克尔·杰克逊的人生也拍成他作品中那种既危险又无害、既痛苦又神奇的童话：影片从1966年印第安纳州加里起步，把父亲约瑟夫塑造成暴君，跟随杰克逊五兄弟的崛起，并让其侄子贾法尔·杰克逊饰演成年后的他。问题在于，这种胜利叙事把一个现实中早已坠入悲剧、争议与诉讼的人物重新包装为受苦的天才与近乎圣徒般的“治愈者”。
电影真正动人的部分仍是音乐本身：11岁时的《I Want You Back》、1983年《Billie Jean》与太空步的重现，都提醒观众杰克逊为何在流行文化中几乎不可取消。可是在情节上，这部片子大多平淡而回避核心阴影，只反复展示他被父亲压迫、恋慕彼得潘、收集异宠、穿上军装式华服，以及周围人不断告诉他“你有多特别”。
文章最尖锐的批评在于，影片在1988年收尾，刻意避开1993年后不断出现的男童性侵指控、庭审与和解，也因此绕开了所谓“梦幻庄园”与公众记忆中最黑暗的部分。作者认为，这种删改会让老观众感到恶心般的缺失，也会帮助遗产管理方继续赚钱，并再次证明：在信息极度泛滥的时代，只要有足够的资金、意志与宣传机器，历史依旧可以被重写。
“Michael” tries to turn Michael Jackson’s life into the same kind of fairy tale his art once projected: dangerous yet harmless, painful yet magical. Opening in Gary, Indiana, in 1966, the film casts Joseph Jackson as a tyrant, traces the rise of the Jackson 5, and uses Jaafar Jackson, the singer’s nephew, to embody the adult star; the result is a triumphalist narrative that repackages a life marked by tragedy, accusation and litigation as that of a wounded prodigy and near-saintly healer.
The film’s most persuasive sequences are the musical ones. A recreation of the Jackson 5 breakout hit from Jackson’s childhood, and the 1983 “Billie Jean” performance with the debut moonwalk, remind viewers why his catalogue has proved practically uncancellable; yet dramatically the movie is often dull, circling through paternal abuse, Peter Pan longing, exotic pets, military-style costumes and endless assurances that he is special while dodging the harder moral questions.
The article’s sharpest complaint is that the film ends in 1988 and thereby evades the allegations of child abuse that surfaced from 1993 onward, the settlements, the trial, and the shadow of Neverland. That omission, the writer argues, leaves older viewers with a nauseous sense of falsification, helps Jackson’s estate recruit a younger audience that can dismiss the ugliness as fake news, and underlines a modern lesson: with enough money, drive and mythmaking, even a deeply contested history can be cleaned up and sold back to the public.
Source: In a new biopic, Michael Jackson is an eccentric saint. Yuck
Subtitle: The megastar’s uncancellable songs are his rightful memorial
Dateline: 4月 23, 2026 03:40 上午