What’s Love Got to Do with It (1993) Touchstone/Drama-Musical RT: 118 minutes Rated R (strong domestic violence including rape, strong language, drug use, some sexuality, thematic elements) Director: Brian Gibson Screenplay: Kate Lanier Music: Stanley Clarke Cinematography: Jamie Anderson Release date: June 25, 1993 (US) Cast: Angela Bassett, Laurence Fishburne, Vanessa Bell Calloway, Jenifer Lewis, Chi McBride (as “Chi”), Phyllis Yvonne Stickney, Khandi Alexander, Pamala Tyson, Penny Johnson, Rae’Ven Larrymore Kelly, Terrence Riggins, Rob LaBelle, James Reyne, Richard T. Jones, Shavar Ross, Damon Hines, Barry “Shabaka” Henley, O’Neal Compton. Box Office: $39.1M (US)
Rating: ****
Normally, musical biopics aren’t as harrowing a viewing experience as What’s Love Got to Do with It. Then again, What’s Love Got to Do with It isn’t your typical musical biopic. Based on the autobiography I, Tina, it centers on the turbulent relationship between singer Tina Turner and her abusive husband Ike. Like all such relationships, it started out fine. Everything was great until it wasn’t. I won’t mince words. Ike, who died in 2007, was a creep. He was a drug-addicted control freak who took out his frustrations on his wife by beating on her. He was a talented musician, but a terrible person. Tina stayed with him for years before finally getting the courage to leave him for good. This is her story.
I’m going to commit a slight breach of protocol by describing a powerful scene that occurs near the end of What’s Love Got to Do with It. After another fight en route to a gig in 1976, a bloodied and battered Tina (Bassett, Malcolm X) leaves the hotel (with nothing!) she’s staying at with Ike (Fishburne, Boyz n the Hood) and goes to a Ramada Inn where she explains her situation to the manager and asks him to give her a room despite having only 32 cents on her person. She promises to pay him back as soon as she can. She starts to take off one her rings, but he stops her telling her it won’t be necessary, he’d be glad to help her. I heard this story before, but the way it plays out moved me like I was hearing it for the first time. This is a strong indicator of how great a movie What’s Love Got to Do with It truly is.
Raised by her grandmother in Nutbush, TN, young Anna Mae Bullock (Kelly) shows early signs of becoming a musical superstar. In the local church choir, she really gets into the music, moving her body and singing loudly. A few years later, she moves to St. Louis to live with her mother (Lewis, Think Like a Man) and older sister (Stickney, New Jack City). This is where she first meets Ike, the star attraction at a local nightclub. He has a penchant for inviting attractive young women to sing with him, typically shooing them away after a few notes. When he hears Anna Mae sing, he’s knocked for a loop. After he speaks with her mother (and money exchanges hands), she becomes part of the band. Later, she becomes Ike’s girlfriend and after that, his wife. He renames her Tina Turner. Their act quickly becomes a success.
Privately, her life is a living nightmare. The smooth charmer turns into a scary monster. Jealous of all the attention she receives, he starts using cocaine which makes him become violent. He starts verbally and physically abusing Tina. Scared out of her mind, she stays with him and takes everything he dishes out including marital rape. It goes on for years. She tries to escape once with their children, but he finds them and drags her back home. It isn’t until her friend Jackie (Calloway, Coming to America) introduces her to Buddhism that Tina begins to find the courage to stand up to Ike and eventually leave him.
The scenes where Ike beats Tina are profoundly upsetting. They’re also angering in the sense that the law did next to nothing to help abused women at the time (the 60s and 70s). Assuming it was reported, that is. Tina is basically trapped in an awful marriage and nobody is willing to help her. Friends, band members and back-up singers are either too scared of Ike or unwilling to give up the perks of being part of his inner circle. Even her own mother betrays her to Ike when she tries to run. Given her circumstances, you don’t just sympathize with Tina; you actively encourage her to get away from Ike. A female audience member at the matinee I attended yelled, “Girl, you need to do a John Bobbitt* on that MF!” If you don’t get the reference, just look below.
As Tina, Bassett is phenomenal. While the real Tina Turner provides the singing voice, the actress is still very much in synch with the singer she’s portraying. Her encompassment of Tina’s physicality, personality and soul when performing is astonishing. She gets that Tina’s stage persona is the complete opposite of her private one, a frightened, vulnerable woman living in fear of the man who promised to love and cherish her. It’s a truly amazing performance matched by Fishburne as Ike. The actor portrays him as a man who could be alternately charming and despicable. Beneath the confident façade, he was highly insecure. He talks about an unhappy childhood defined by his father’s murder. He needs to be the center of attention; he can’t stand that it’s all going to his wife. He’s the one who made her; he should get the credit. It would have been easy to depict Ike Turner as a one-dimensional villain; instead, Fishburne gives him depth by displaying his many layers. It’s easily his best performance.
Directed by Brian Gibson (Breaking Glass, Poltergeist II), What’s Love Got to Do with It is a truly remarkable film. It’s hard to take at times but Gibson balances things out nicely with some amazing musical performances. The two that immediately spring to mind are “Shake a Tailfeather” and “Proud Mary”. Then, of course, there’s the title song performed at the end intercut with footage of the real Tina Turner. There’s some question as to the factual veracity of What’s Love Got to Do with It. I can’t say; I wasn’t there. Ike denied a lot of his ex-wife’s claims. However, since nobody ever sued Tina or autobiography co-writer Kurt Loder for libel, I’m willing to believe her side of the story. Either way, there’s no denying that What’s Love Got to Do with It is excellent work.
*= Right before the movie came out, Lorena Bobbitt cut off her husband John’s penis and threw it away in a field citing years of abuse as the reason. It was big news that summer (and the source of many Free Willy jokes).
