‘Taurus’ Review: Machine Gun Kelly Gets His Own ‘Purple Rain,’ But Maddie Hasson Swipes the Spotlight
variety.comGuy Lodge Film CriticThat Colson Baker can act is no revelation. The rap-rocker, better known to his legions of fans as Machine Gun Kelly, has already held his own in a dozen or so roles for film and TV, demonstrating a scuzzy on-screen charisma within admittedly limited boundaries.
His canny casting as Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee in the Netflix biopic “The Dirt” paid off, so it’s not surprising to see him return to the rockstar-as-rockstar well in the significantly artsier “Taurus.” This time, however, he makes a rather more personal investment — not just starring, but serving as executive producer, composer and script consultant — in a project modeled on, if not his own life, certainly his own celebrity aura and sound.
The good news is that he can still act, serving director Tim Sutton’s unpleasant but smokily atmospheric descent into Hollywood Hades with solemn commitment and a lurching air of physical and spiritual ruin — this is about as valiantly unflattering as vanity projects get.
The bad news is that the wispily tragic character of “Cole,” his alienated, self-destructive but wildly popular alter ego, hardly seems worth Baker’s extensive efforts.
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