As a kid of the 80s, I love 80s music and 80s pop culture is close to my heart. I still remember distinctly when Milli Vanilli became famous, and I can even recall some of the lyrics of their hit songs Girl You Know It’s True and Blame It On The Rain. Of course, it was a huge shock when it was revealed in 1990 that they had never sung a single note, so scandalous that they had to refund people who had bought their albums and gave back the Grammy Award they had won.

There was a documentary called Milli Vanilli released last year, Simon Verhoeven created a biopic instead, starring Tijan Njie as Robert ‘Rob’ Pilatus and Elan Ben Ali as Fabrice ‘Fab’ Morvan. Firstly I thought the casting was absolutely spot on as Njie and Ali looked so much like the real Rob and Fab, and they also possess the athleticism and dancing prowess to portray the pop duo. Matthias Schweighöfer stars as the music producer/manager Frank Farian, the mastermind behind the disco-pop sensation Boney M. that took the 1970s by storm.

When we first met Rob and Fab individually, they were trained dancers in Germany and France, respectively. I learned that Rob was adopted by a white family in Munich, and the movie touches upon his struggles in finding his birth parents, It’s also interesting to learn how the two got discovered and how they got the name, the first part ‘Milli’ was the nickname of Frank’s girlfriend Ingrid (Bella Dayne). Verhoeven uses a ‘breaking the fourth wall’ approach in his directing, which feels a bit strange at first, but I actually think it adds a cool twist that makes it stand out from typical biopics. The highlight for me was definitely the performances of the two main actors; there were moments when I totally forgot they were playing Rob and Fab because they looked so much like them.

While the pop duo committed fraud by lip-syncing to their own records, Njie’s and Ali’s performances are mesmerizing and wonderfully authentic. Right from the beginning, it’s obvious that while they both aspire to be stars, their personalities and life approaches are quite different. Fab comes off as the more down-to-earth one, a realist even. He often becomes the ‘voice of reason’ for Rob, who gets caught up in the glitz and glamor. It’s no surprise that Fab was able to go back to living a normal life (even working as a restaurant server!) while Rob didn’t handle the band’s downfall as well which led to his death from an accidental overdose.

Schweighöfer’s performance can be over the top at times. Perhaps that’s how Frank was, but the movie certainly doesn’t paint him in a sympathetic light. Verhoeven likely took some creative liberties narratively, notably in Milli’s involvement in the discovery and management of the duo.

I’m not going to pick apart fact vs fiction in this review as we’d be missing the point. What matters is the essence of the story, which is the tragic rise and fall of Milli Vanilli and a realistic glimpse into the dangers that come with instant fame. It’s been reported that Rob and Fab wanted to sing their own songs, but Frank deemed they weren’t good enough. The film shows Frank recording tracks with the real singers, including John Davis (Samuel S. Franklin) and they acknowledged that Rob & Fab have the looks, the moves, and sheer star power that contributed to their popularity.

It’s really sad to think that their success was all a sham, yet they chose to live in luxury instead of being wise with their money. If they had just kept things low-key and invested their millions, they wouldn’t have crashed and burned so dramatically when the truth came out. Their hapless assistant Todd Headlee (Graham Rogers) had to scramble to cater to their demands (mostly Rob’s) and manage their shenanigans. Behind the scenes, things were getting intense, and the pressure on them was mounting. Even during the peak of their popularity, Rob and Fab were living on borrowed time, their success felt like a ticking time bomb.

There are so many music biopics out there, but this one is an entertaining one that transports you to the 80s and offers a potent cautionary tale about the tempting nature of fame. The music by Segun Akinola is enjoyable, and Verhoeven does a nice job staging the concert and musical numbers. Farian sure knows how to pick the catchiest songs, as the ones featured in this movie are still stuck in my head even a week later. This movie is definitely worth checking out, especially for those who were around when Milli Vanilli became a global sensation.

Have you seen this film? What are your thoughts about Milli Vanilli?

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