While the past few months (and years) have had no shortage of biopics or musicals, Michael Gracey’s Better Man is a masterful execution that never overwhelms viewers with too many songs or cheesy impersonations. You just might leave the theater as a newfound fan of Robbie Williams.

“I don’t give a fuck what they think.”
“You give a fuck what everyone thinks.” 

It’s hard to pin down who exactly Robbie Williams is. To some, he’s perceived as a narcissistic diva. To others, he’s calmed down from his ‘90s antics to raise his family in Los Angeles. As his new biopic Better Man explores, Williams’ pop stardom is fueled by a need to entertain by any means necessary — even if it means destroying yourself and your public self-image in the process. As he would claim, his presentation is simply one big “cabaret” we can’t help but watch. 

While Williams’ 2023 self-titled Netflix docuseries saw him reflecting on archival footage throughout his life, director Michael Gracey (The Greatest Showman) opted for a different route: recruiting actor Jonno Davies to embody Williams as a well-crafted CGI monkey. The move has generated a significant online discussion, dividing those who have and have not seen the film. 

For the former, the choice to make Williams a monkey makes perfect sense — it’s how he views himself and has been a throughline of the singer’s career. (During a previous tour, he blended his face with a monkey on the backdrop.) During a post-screening Q&A, Williams showed up in a leopard coat to commend Davies for his dedication to the role. The actor had been a longtime fan of the musician and saw him perform as a child, which allowed him to do a brilliant job of imitating Williams’ mannerisms and emotional states. 

At the beginning, Williams’ childhood is driven by a common need to be liked and fit in with his classmates. However, that need heartbreakingly goes unmet, as viewers watch his younger self get bullied, yelled at by his dad when trying to sing along with him, and put on a show as a pirate in a school play — only to realize his father didn’t bother to show up. 

If you can’t get approval from those closest to you, you’ll spend your life trying to fill that void by seeking praise from the entire world. And that’s exactly what Williams does. 

By 15, he goes for an audition and ultimately joins the boy band Take That. Immediately, the teenager is propelled into the club scene and adulthood, with zero guidance on navigating it all. The band’s manager turns Robert into “Robbie,” giving him an alter ego of sorts to hide behind. 

Compared to the rest of the band members, there’s something different about him. He stares too intensely. He presents himself as carefree when getting kicked out of Take That. Over the past few years, the singer has been open about being neurodivergent, specifically on the autism spectrum with dyslexia, providing a new lens to look at Williams’ life and the no-holding-back way he presents himself. 

Shortly after the band signs their record deal, Davies-as-Williams launches into a performance of Williams’ hit “Rock DJ” which is Gracey’s shining directorial moment. The brilliant choreography was first practiced in a warehouse, as it took about a year-and-a-half to obtain a permit to film it over four days with 500 dancers on London’s famed Regent Street. 

That dedication shines through with spotless editing, costume and scene changes, and hilarious gags like Williams doing a flip off of a double-decker bus. Instead of what very well could have been a few extras dancing around in the street, genuine thought and creativity turned this sequence into the peak movie musical moment of the last decade. 

However, the joy of that moment in Williams’ life fades quickly. While he is trying to find himself as a solo artist, he meets Nicole Appleton (played by Raechelle Banno), a member of a girl group — and it feels like a match made in heaven, as they twirl around a yacht to “She’s The One.” 

Throughout the choreography, viewers are seamlessly transported to get glimpses of their relationship status, between Williams’s candlelight proposal, the couple preparing to have a child, and then Appleton’s manager making her get an abortion. While we still see them in love on the boat, the damage has already been done to their relationship, and Williams struggles to cope with losing the child. 

Throughout Better Man, Williams constantly toes the line between utter self-loathing and knowing he has to give the crowd what they want to feel fulfilled. When he drives away from the band, he is flooded by the sounds of fans reeling from his removal and launches into a moving performance of “Come Undone.” The 2002 track addresses this dichotomy, as Williams points out he’s “so self-aware, so full of shit” and “so ‘Need your love,’ so ‘Fuck you all!’” 

He drives full-throttle in the dark, recklessly swerving cars. When Williams nearly hits one, he visualizes his father leaving on a bus. It’s enough to make him pause and slow down, similar to a dream sequence, but it also distracts him and causes him to crash into another car. The impact launches Williams underwater, surrounded by rabid, distraught fans and paparazzi flashes, preventing him from breaking the ice to escape to the surface. 

The other moment that best showcases this emotional tightrope is the recreation of Williams’ Knebworth performance, which found Davies performing in the CGI outfit to a crowd of thousands. Better Man had been gearing up for something regarding Williams being haunted by inner self-doubts. Represented visually as different monkified versions of himself, there’s his inner child, the “Rock DJ” skeleton, and more costumes that he wears. 

During the biggest moment of his career, those voices are at their strongest, and Williams decides to face them head-on in a violent battle scene with a heartbreaking ending. Yet, this moment also proved to be the saving grace for him to turn around his life. 

Going into this film, Williams was probably the last person I expected to feel a relatability toward. I’m an American girl and a few months shy of turning 25. He is a year younger than my mother. 

However, I spent the majority of 2024 in a similar dark hole following a layoff, the death of my childhood dog, and watching a relative suffer from a debilitating drug addiction. I was ultimately diagnosed with anxiety and depression by a therapist I couldn’t afford. I didn’t leave the house. I isolated myself from nearly all in-person relationships while putting on a facade on the internet. Look at me! Look at what I wrote! Aren’t you oh SO proud of it? I couldn’t look in the mirror or photos of myself. I wanted to be thinner, blonder, any step closer to the representation of “perfection” I’d been spoonfed since childhood — fueled by social media comparisons. 

There’s a part of all of us as humans that has felt like a monkey and forced to perform, just not nearly on the level that Williams has. Along with that relatable aspect, he’s also a fascinating performer to watch, especially if you didn’t know much about him. 

While the past few months (and years) have had no shortage of biopics or musicals, Gracey’s Better Man is a masterful execution that never overwhelms viewers with too many songs or cheesy impersonations. You just might leave the theater as a newfound fan of Robbie Williams.

Grade: A+

Oscars Prospects:
Likely: Best Visual Effects
Should be Considered: Best Visual Effects, Best Sound

Where to Watch: In Theaters