The late Tina Turner was a musical sensational that will be treasured and respected for years to come. Known as ‘’The Queen of Rock’’’ and for several iconic songs that showcased her unique gravelly vocals, Tina Turner’s musical career was incredibly successful, but also slightly tainted due to her abusive relationship with her boyfriend, Ike Turner. Rising above said abuse to become a icon even stronger than before, Turner’s appeal among all crowds of music-lovers was cemented through her multiple Grammy wins (12 in total), becoming the first black artist and first woman to be on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine, being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice (once with Ike and the other by herself) and for being one of the best-selling record artists of all time. This popularity secured a film biopic centred around her life, with the one in question titled What’s Love Got to Do with It, being released in 1993. After moving to St. Louis to live with her mother (who abandoned her as a child) and sister, a teenage Anna Mae Bullock (played by Angela Bassett) sees band leader and singer Ike Turner (played by Laurence Fishburne) perform at a nightclub and instantly becomes smitten. After proving her vocal abilities to him, Ike decides to mentor Anna into becoming a star as well as produce her music, leading to an impressive collaborative career as “Ike & Tina Turner” (which he renamed her to without her consent). After getting married and having children, Tina starts to see the true side of Ike, who has grown more abusive and jealous of her career against his failure to leave an impact in the industry. Trying to brush it off and focus on her music, Tina’s tolerance for her husband’s wicked nature will eventually reach a breaking point, pushing her away from that lifestyle and opening herself up to a much brighter and more fruitful future. Being critically and commercially successful as well as earning two Oscar nominations for its leads, What’s Love Got to Do with It delivers the story of Tina Turner in a fabricated but still raw manner that makes it a decently composed film.

The film was based on the 1986 autobiography, I, Tina written by Turner and MTV news correspondent and music critic Kurt Loder, and wrote about most of the key events that took place in Tina Turner’s life involving her childhood in Nutbush, Tennessee, her initial rise to fame while working alongside Ike, the abusive marriage and subsequent divorce, and then her resurgence in the 1980s with a rock n roll edge that stuck with her persona for the rest of her career and life. For a film roughly two hours in length, it squeezes in all these events quite nicely with a brisk pace that keeps the momentum going that might sacrifice an in-depth analysis of each period but conveys the emotional turmoils everyone is going through quite nicely. The film isn’t the most complex, surprising or even most moving biopic of a musicians life that you can see as it appears to not highlight aspects of Turner’s life that many weren’t already aware of, but the drive this film has in portraying this life story emulates the emotional strength and even unstoppable energy that a film of this kind requires not just because of who its portraying, but also because of the type of movie it is. It doesn’t veer out of the realms of reality to the point of feeling unrealistic, but the aesthetics of the film cries for a bygone era of aggressive film production, and one that captures a sense of personality, punchiness and liveliness that becomes embedded into this picture. It balances a decent mix between Turner’s on-stage and off-stage life to feel like it gives a decent handling of both, and it’s assisted by solid directing by Brian Gibson who commands what could be a very by-the-numbers biopic film and make just that hint more engaging. Despite a limited filmography mostly consisting of TV material and smaller films, his experience leading projects like the 1980 film, Breaking Glass, and the 1991 TV movie The Josephine Baker Story, helped him construct a story based in the entertainment industry and the faults and dangers that come with it. A hurdle that this film faced was actually from the talent herself, who had issue with the multiple fictionalized elements featured in this story about her own life. While most biopics are going to alter certain aspects in order for it to work better in a cinematic landscape, this film does change a lot about Turner’s life, and it can sometimes veer into various film cliches as a means of manipulating its audience into feeling a certain emotion. It isn’t to a painful degree, but it is felt especially during the end where it trades out realism for a climatic sense of cinematic satisfaction, which can come across as forceful and pretty unnecessary as the majority of the film did at least feel authentic in its portrayal.

For a movie like this to work, they needed to cast Tina Turner perfectly. Turner herself wasn’t overly involved with the production of the film outside of providing some of the music, so it was in the hands of the higher ups to who would portray her, and they went through several options like Halle Berry, Robin Givens, Pam Grier, Whitney Houston, Janet Jackson, and Vanessa L. Williams before Angela Bassett was chosen. For an actress that has been sadly overlooked throughout her career, she has rarely missed the mark when it comes to her performances, and her portrayal as Tina Turner is truly impressive, showcasing both the meek fresh-eyed country girl whisked into this glisty lifestyle by a dreamy musician, as well as the confidant, sparky and machine-like performer she would become once she matured with her music. She’s wonderfully gritty and raw with her emotions which make some of the harrowing moments especially hard to stomach (any moment she is being abused is painfully well acted) and despite only lip-syncing the music due to not having a strong enough voice to mimic her, she nails the performance style of Turner from her movements, facial expressions and flamboyant style (even Turner herself said Bassett was ‘’perfect’’ as her). Similarly, Laurence Fishburne is also very effective as Ike Turner, capturing the aggressive, drug-filled attitude of the role, but also the suave, charismatic individual that would make it believable that someone could fall for him. These two are clearly the strongest aspects of this film as the rest of the supporting cast don’t do anything to stand out. No actor is awful, but the movie doesn’t really seem to care much about any other person in this story outside of its lead which results in a lot of nameless faces that exist to spout lines and not much else, which can sadly result in certain performers feeling wasted (you have Virginia Capers from Fresh Prince of Bel Air in this, and she gets a single scene in the opening?) One thing that does plagues the two leads is that as the film continues, the two start to feel more like Hollywood-ised versions of themselves and not like actual people, which can be a problem when you want to feel as authentic as possible to the point where you showcase the dark, abusive side of this real life story (Fishburne does start to feel more like a typical 80s action movie pimp than a real human being as the film continues, especially during the final scene) . Another complaint laid at this film from Turner was how it portrayed her as a victim, and Ike Turner also claims this films portrayal of him hurt his reputation (which sounds hard to believe after everything else that’s happened has already done that), so it feels like neither party is entirely satisfied with how they turned out on film. While Basset is great and the movie doesn’t paint her as weak in any way, it does directly focus on her surviving Ike’s abuse front and centre, with not much else discussed about her life and career outside of that element so it could come across like that.

As previously mentioned, the film takes advantage of the time periods its set in and embraces the style and vibe of each era. While its not to the extent of being super stylized and adopting a more fantastical style, the production design by Stephen Altman and the costume design by Ruth E. Carter (who would later handle the costumes for Bassett again in Black Panther I and II) is effective at convincing audience of each era without having to constant state it in the dialogue or even in the text bubbles that continuously pop up throughout. Whether it be the casual attires on everybody throughout the film, or the get-ups worn by those who are performing, where its allowed to get a little more out-there and crazy, Carter seems to be able to capture the clothing style of the black community within each of these periods (specifically the musical crowd) and it adds that sense of believable authenticity to the environment. The song sequences are also very well handled with the tunes still being great to listen to all these years later and Bassett’s portrayal of these numbers getting people equally as excited and impressed as they would have for them originally. It may only be hearing these famous songs again through the lens of a film biopic, but the grit in the performance does help portray the strength behind the vocals and the words, so its still great to see nonetheless. The score is also noticeably effective in a good way, with composer Stanley Clarke providing a piece that dramatically accentuates moments in a highly dramatized manner, but still managing to match the mood and time period the movie was made in. It adds to the feel and drama of the movie rather than taking away from it, allowing the score to stand out without being distracting and be effective without being too complex.

While music biopics are a dime a dozen now, and while this one doesn’t do anything much better than others to warrant a must-see, the strengths of What’s Love Got to Do with It are good enough o make it one worth seeing. With Tina Turner’s recent passing, it made sense to tackle the film that explored her rise to becoming the Queen of Rock that everybody knows her to be. It is a shame that she wasn’t overly fond of the end results as it repurposed tragic moments in her life she wished to stay away from (and even then, portrayed them not always the most truthfully), but it did seem to get the job done in showcasing her talents to the world, and it seems to have paid off in that regard. The film is well composed, acted very well (especially from its leads) and showcases its musical strengths through the performances and the energy from behind the scenes as well as those on-screen. Its not an amazing movie as the script could’ve done some revisions to work in some more truth in the matter, it could’ve avoided some of the more cinematic tropes near the final act, and for those that just aren’t into music biopics, this one isn’t going to sway you any different, but the quality of some of its elements makes it strong enough to make it worth checking out. Might not be simply the best, but it will remind you of some of her best (River Deep, Mountain High is still fantastic).

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