Iconic People Who Need Big-Budget Biopics About Their Lives
Throughout the history of cinema, we have seen numerous well-made and riveting biopics about iconic people and their lives. In fact, we have recently been treated to the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the head of the Manhattan Project, which ushered in the atomic age of weaponry. That one is a biopic for the ages.
The Christopher Nolan, Cillian Murphy-led film brilliantly handles Oppenheimer’s life from being a student at Cambridge to further expanding teachings on quantum physics at the University of California, Berkeley to taking over the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos, New Mexico. It was a movie we didn’t know we needed.
While the film was well told and intriguing, it also had us wondering what other iconic people needed a biopic. There are plenty out there whose life story is remarkable for one reason or another, plenty whose tale needs to be told. The following ones we think could use such a film.
Iconic People Who Need Big-Budget Biopics
Nikola Tesla
Make no mistake about it, Nikola Tesla was one of the most iconic and fascinating people to ever live. An inventor of high regard, Tesla was also a mechanical and electrical engineer and is well-known for his design of the modern-day AC (alternating current) electricity supply system.
Not only would his professional life be an interesting story, but his personal life as well. Tesla was a lifelong bachelor, who once commented in his early days that he felt he could never be worthy enough to have a woman in his life.
He always considered women to be superior in every way, although his numerous patents and inventions proved he could handle his own as a man. Tesla’s biopic would be one to watch.
Frank Sinatra
We have seen movies in the past that included actors who have portrayed the Chairman of the Board, Frank Sinatra, but there hasn’t been one solely dedicated to Ol’ Blue Eyes.
Frank Sinatra’s life story would be fascinating to watch, following him from a young crooner to one of the most dominant forces in the music industry.
His tempestuous personal life and his four marriages, highlighted by his second marriage to Ava Gardner, would be fun to watch as would his reputed dealings with the mafia and Chicago mob boss Sam Giancana. One biopic film might not be enough to tell Sintra’s story.
Richard Pryor
When Richard Pryor performed his stand-up comedy routine, he consistently pushed the boundaries of good taste; it was something that audiences loved about the man. A biopic about Pryor would have to show his younger days and the comedy legends that influenced Pryor.
It would also have to show Pryor’s slow downward spiral into heavy drug use, culminating with his fiery jaunt down the street after a freebasing cocaine incident (as reported to the LA police).
Pryor claimed that his injuries were caused by him pouring rum all over himself and lighting himself on fire.
Either way, his life is a story worth telling.
Hilary Clinton
This biopic could be a very polarizing one, depending on one’s outlook of former politician and presidential candidate, Hilary Clinton. Whether we’d actually see all of her crimes put on display would be one reason for tuning into the biopic or would her influence keep the story in a positive light?
It would also be interesting to see how a filmmaker would tackle the scandal her husband, President Bill Clinton, was involved in with Monica Lewinsky.
Chris Farley
Chris Farley lived life fast and dangerously. Eventually, it all caught up with him at the young age of 33. His biopic would be filled with both laughs and tears, as audiences would watch his meteoric rise and his downward spiral into the cocaine and morphine drug abuses that ended his life.
Farley was an amazing comedian, full of energy and surprisingly nimble for a man of his girth. His life is a tragic story, but one that needs a big screen to tell it.
Amelia Earhart
Amelia Earhart was a pioneer in American aviation. She became the very first woman aviator to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean, a feat she was trying to accomplish going over the Pacific when she disappeared.
In between that time, Earhart set numerous flying records and was key in putting together the organization for women pilots called The Ninety-Nines. Earhart’s life and mysterious death is one biopic that needs to fly across the big screen.
Rosa Parks
If anyone’s biopic needs to be made, it is of Rosa Parks who, as a young woman, refused to remove herself from the “colored” section on a bus when the “white” section filled. This caused the Montgomery, Alabama bus lawsuit that eventually changed the segregation laws in Alabama. Parks’ life is a wonderful tale of perseverance and change.
