The story of the dangers of fame and stardom is one that has made for some pretty successful films in the past, but probably the ones that have stuck with people recently are ones about those in the music industry. Despite how tragic it is, those that are in the industry are vulnerable to a lot of pressure and harsh restrictions, which has led to a lot of people buckling under the stress and have been broken due to it, with examples like Elvis, Britney Spears, Judy Garland, Kesha, Elton John, Freddy Mercury, etc. Not all of these stories had bad endings, but they all faced similar issues, and these did make for good stories, but one that suffered a lot of tragedy in her life got a movie showcasing this, even if it wasn’t directly about her life, and that was famous singer Whitney Huston, in the 1992 movie, The Bodyguard. Former Secret Service agent and professional bodyguard, Frank Farmer (played by Kevin Costner) is asked to protect beloved actress and musician Rachel Marron (played by Whitney Houston) after she receives intimidating mail from a stalker who has already reached the level of breaking into her house. With most of the people around her wanting her to be safe, they called upon Farmer who is apparently the best of the best, but Rachel’s care-free arrogant attitude doesn’t sit well with Farmer, who repeatedly wishes out of the job. As the two start to spend more time together, a connection is formed, but that gets in the way of Frank’s job and his rule of never wanting to get attached to those he protects, and with the stalker still on the loose and the Academy Awards soon arriving with Rachel as a nominee, the stage is literally set for things to go awry. What feels like a traditional sappy rom com tries to tackle something that applies to real life celebrities in this romantic thriller, but it didn’t seem to fully pay off as this film was a critical flop when it was released and panned for a lot of its elements.

A lot of the pieces for this movie feel like they could be handle correctly if taken in the right direction, but a bigger issue with the movie as a whole is how it is delivered as a product overall. The director for this movie, Mick Jackson, was a relatively new name at the time and was mostly known for directing many documentaries and drama productions for the BBC. This kind of inexperience doesn’t wreck a movie’s chances, but it definitely didn’t help this movie, which feels like it has decent pieces scattered throughout, but is a mess in terms of tone and pacing. As previously stated, how this movie is originally laid out with its characters, tone and set-up feel like something akin to a traditional 80s romance film with lesser stakes and a more light-hearted atmosphere, but the subject matter is anything but that and tackles something a lot more adult, uncomfortable, and real. It makes the romance elements feel less realistic and more contrived, and the realistic aspects feel watered down and not heavily as addressed as they should be. One of the things that was criticized the heaviest about this movie was how awful the screenplay was. This is very interesting as the writer for this movie is Lawrence Kasdan; the man who was responsible for writing movies like Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back and Raiders of the Lost Ark, so he’s clearly a talented writer. Considering this was in the early steps of his career (This was actually the first feature film he helped write), it makes sense that he wouldn’t be great at the start. The movie’s tonal whiplash keeps making it hard to pin down a specific feel, a lot of elements in the story are decent in theory, but not in practice, the characters aren’t made very complex, a lot of scenes feel repetitive, cliched and annoying, and it doesn’t have a very good satisfying conclusion. Its sad to see that a pretty good idea about exploring the dangers of music celebrity-hood through the lens of a relationship between the star and the bodyguard wasn’t handled as effectively as it could have been.

The manner in which a lot of the characters are written are very much like what people would see out of a sleazy 80s romance or even a stereotypical action flick. These are very blanket characters with very blanket roles, so it’s a not a movie of complexity (ironically given the subject matter) despite featuring decently known people like Gary Kemp, Ralph Waite and Bill Cobbs. However, it is one of personal connection; not only because of how eerily similar the circumstances Whitney Houston’s character matches that of what she most likely experienced, but her and Costner were tightly connected before and during the production and were very good friends. This connection was what convinced Costner (who helped produce the movie) to suggest Huston for the role, and in light of her passing, the connections do feel a bit more impactful with this knowledge in mind. The leads are the only characters that feel like they have any meat on them as all the side character feel like rejects out of any random Sylvester Stallone movie, but even then, they don’t do too much with them either. They start off with nice concepts, but never develop it further; instead focusing on a romance that doesn’t have enough chemistry to feel effective, mainly due to the actors. Costner is known for being a pretty unemotional actor and with Houston’s inexperience with acting, it was obviously going to lead to a weak couple with annoyingly bland character traits, but to their credit, the scenes they share together are some of the only scenes with any sense of average chemistry. Since they are essentially playing themselves, its not too hard for them to at least act out a generic conversation, but as an actual couple, the spark just isn’t there.

For a film that is supposed to incorporate elements of both a romance and a thriller, its hard to say that the film doesn’t try to do this with its mixing of tones, but it definitely doesn’t do it well because neither is handled in an interesting or correct manner. The romance honestly feels pretty useless in this film; the actors don’t have chemistry and the movie as a whole really doesn’t require the characters to fall in love to make this work, instead it feels like its forced into this narrative just because movies at the time with shared male and female roles had to end up together for some reason. As for the thriller aspect, in terms of the identity of the killer being a mystery, it goes in a far less realistic route by actually given the character a face and an identity that really makes it feel like some lame action film. It would have been more effective if the character remained nameless and he/she just represented anyone who ever made an attempt on a celebrity’s life. The film is actually filmed pretty well, with nice cinematography by Andrew Dunn who takes an otherwise pretty basic movie and gets some not complicated, but still well-done shots that show off the environment in a fun manner. The soundtrack for the film was something that earned a lot of reception, considering that a lot of these songs were already favored Whitney Houston songs. They don’t add much to the overall film, but these are pretty great songs on their own and considering the film is about a musician actress, it makes sense to use her actually singing, so it works out.

The Bodyguard isn’t anything that terrible, but it isn’t anything that memorable either. Apparently, the movie is set to be remade in 2022 and it honestly feels like a movie that could be made into something a lot better. A lot of these aspects for the film on their own aren’t awful, they’re just handled in a not so perfect way which resulted in a movie with a messy tone, forgettable characters, a couple with no chemistry, and a subject matter that could be taken in a deep realistic manner but is instead presented like a standard 80s film. For those who like the two lead actors or those who are suckers for this kind of sappy romance, this will be fine, but otherwise nothing’s going to protect you from what this movie has to offer.

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