In Search of a Credible Elvis Movie

Baz Luhrmann’s latest exercise in excess, a new biopic of Elvis Presley, called simply Elvis, opens across American theaters this weekend. As ever with Luhrmann, it’s a mixture of sensory-popping provocation, cartoonish performances (Tom Hanks’s Colonel Tom Parker is written and played as if he’s walked out of a Snidely Whiplash short), an eclectic soundtrack and, once the sturm und drang settles, a surprisingly conventional account of a decidedly unconventional man.