Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 25, 1993 TAG: 9306250158
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By Mike Mayo Correspondent
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
At the end, the main character isn't dead. She hasn't been killed in a plane crash or done in by a drug overdose. She's alive and kicking - literally.
If this story of Tina Turner's survival through a horrendous marriage and all the excesses of rock 'n' roll is more than a little uncritical of its subject, that's an understandable flaw. After all, the script is based on her autobiography.
As it's depicted here, her life has been anything but ideal. She made some bad decisions when she was young and had to live with the consequences. True or false, that's the stuff of good melodrama.
Young Anna Mae Bullock's first memory is of her mother's leaving her in the care of her grandmother. Her story begins in 1958 when the teen-age Anna Mae (Angela Bassett) is reunited with her mother in St. Louis. On her first night in the big city, she sees band leader Ike Turner (Larry Fishburne), an experienced charmer with a satiny line of talk.
Anna Mae is an easy conquest and, at first, the most recent in a long line of women who had sung for Ike's band and shared his bed. But Anna Mae - soon renamed Tina - is different, and the popular music business is on the edge of a revolution. With Tina's growly, high-energy vocals, Ike's brand of rhythm and blues becomes a hit on records and on tour.
When the walls of segregation begin to fall and black performers are heard on what had been "white" radio stations, their popularity grows. So does Ike's drug use and, eventually, his physical abuse. Throughout, the focus stays squarely on Tina. That's a mixed blessing.
The film doesn't show much about what it was like to be a black woman in the 1950s and '60s. Beyond the band's immediate concerns, it has little to say about one of the most vibrant and creative periods in the history of popular music. Instead, we learn a lot about Ike and Tina, more than some will want to know.
Angela Bassett and Larry Fishburne do Oscar-caliber work. Both of them have that "presence" that turns actors into stars. But at the end of the movie, Tina emerges as pure as the driven snow while Ike has been transformed into a monster straight from a Stephen King novel. If he'd been more human and she'd been more flawed, their conflict would have been more believable and more moving.
Still, British director Brian Gibson ("The Josephine Baker Story") avoids most of the cliches that plague rock movies. The musical numbers, all re-recorded by the real Tina Turner, are part of the narrative flow of the story. Gibson is able to handle one delicate plot line - Tina's acceptance of Buddhism - without making it seem forced or phony. And when Tina does finally fight back, it's one of those stand-up-and-cheer moments that Hollywood movies do so well.
Despite its flaws, "What's Love Got to Do With It" is a genuine crowd-pleaser that could easily turn into one of this summer's sleeper hits.
What's Love Got To Do With It: **1/2
A Touchstone release playing at the Valley View Mall 6. 114 min. Rated R for sexual content, strong language, extremely strong domestic violence.
by CNB