When the camera captures the forging of a pop star

In 1988, George Michael was 25 years old, had broken up Wham! and was immersed in the tour for his debut solo album, Faith, with which he had fulfilled the dream of all musicians who leave the group that launched them to fame: not only to match the success of the mothership, but also to consolidate himself in the pop constellation. When the tour stopped at the Palais de Paris-Bercy and filled it for two nights, the appointment served to record a promotional video for the single Monkey. Far from settling for just that track, the cameras filmed the entirety of both concerts in 35mm; a fact that tells us as much about the lavish philosophy of the music industry of the time as it does about the precocious status of royalty that Michael had conquered.

The truth, however, is that the singer himself saw himself reaching his zenith as a young man, just as we hear him say in the short film that prologues George Michael: The Faith Tour, a concert film made with the previously unreleased material from those Parisian recitals, and which is being released shortly before the tenth anniversary of the artist's death. A gift for fans that captures a star forging his aura in real time. This is clear in the playful performance of the song Faith, anticipated by the guitar and sunglasses that the music video had made iconic.

The staging, with millimeter-precise direction and amplified by the multiplicity of cameras and cranes, seems to know the movements the protagonist will make, and creates a hierarchy in which both the audience and the band adopt an eminently anonymous role. Thus, the story passes exclusively through a voice of crystalline technique and a body that radiates a positive sensuality (made explicit in I want your sex, which closes the encore and the film) and appeals to all audiences. At this point, the final image of the stage closing like a cage and dimming the light on a George Michael who did not openly declare his homosexuality until a decade later is revealing.