Biographical movies can cover a wide range of people and issues, delivered with varying degrees of quality. To help you choose a great modern biopic movie,
Rotten Tomatoes provides movie ratings based on reviews. Here are a few of their best biopics:
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"Selma" (2014)
"Selma" portrays the story of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s efforts to attain voting rights for African-Americans, focusing on the three marches from Selma to Montgomery. In spite of widespread violent resistance, King, played by David Oyelowo, and his followers succeeded in getting the Voting Rights Act of 1965 signed into law, charting a new course for U.S. history.
In his review of this modern biopic, Odie Henderson at
RogerEbert.com observed that "this is an emotional movie that aims to anger, sadden and inspire viewers, sometimes in the same scene. 'Selma' takes no prisoners."
Ann Hornaday at
The Washington Post wrote that "Selma" "carries viewers along on a tide of breathtaking events so assuredly that they never drown in the details or the despair, but instead are left buoyed: The civil rights movement and its heroes aren't artifacts from the distant past, but messengers sent on an urgent mission for today."
"Man on Wire" (2008)
Set against the backdrop of the Manhattan skyline, "Man on Wire" explores the daring accomplishment of Philippe Petit who dazzled, inspired, and upset onlookers on Aug. 7, 1974 as he danced on a high wire between the World Trade Center buildings without a net for nearly an hour. Petit was arrested for the illegal performance, which he had planned since first hearing of the idea to build the towers.
A. O. Scott of
The New York Times wrote, "this lovely, touching film demonstrates that the World Trade Center sky walk was an important event. The proof is in the emotions - amusement, amazement, awe - evoked by those images of a tiny human figure balancing above a void."
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"Mr. Turner" (2014)
In "Mr. Turner," Timothy Spall stars as J. M. W. Turner, the great 19th century British landscape painter. An examination of the complex public and private life of a creative eccentric, t
his modern biopic movie transports us into the artist's world, according to Matt Zoller Seitz's review from RogerEbert.com.
After watching this film, we may discover that "the compass by which we measure our own experience has grown wider.
Only art can do that, and it may be all that art can do," noted A. O. Scott at The New York Times.
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