Photographs by GREG WILLIAMS
Words by MATT MAYTUM

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Return of the king… The maestro of movie showmanship revives the king of rock ’n’ roll with unseen footage of Elvis in Vegas to create a unique cinematic experience. Baz Luhrmann tells Hollywood Authentic how he found treasure in salt mines and made a poem of EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert.

Is it ever possible to recapture the thrill of seeing one of the greatest ever music artists live in their prime? Baz Luhrmann’s EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert answers that question with a resounding yes. The unearthing of new footage of a cultural touchstone is a gift for die-hard Elvis fans, and offers younger generations the opportunity to see what all the fuss was about. Much more than a concert movie, EPiC sprang from Luhrmann and his team’s archival discoveries during the making of his blockbuster 2022 feature Elvis, starring Austin Butler.

Often thought to be apocryphal, lost footage from Elvis’ famous Vegas residency turned out to be more than mere rumour during the making of Elvis. ‘Ernst Jorgensen [author and Elvis expert] said, “You know there are these lost reels of the show?”’ Luhrmann recalls. ‘And I thought to myself, “Wow, maybe we could use that footage in the [Elvis] movie itself, rather than build a stage – because of budgets.”’ The footage – originally shot for doc Elvis: That’s the Way It Is – belonged to MGM and had been stored in salt mines in Kansas, to prevent water from damaging the negative. When Baz’s team went digging, ‘not only did they find the footage,’ he explains between sips of miso soup, ‘they actually found a kind of treasure trove of materials – 69 boxes, 59 hours of footage.’

That incredible haul not only contained footage of Elvis’ 1970 Vegas shows at the International Hotel, shot on anamorphic 35mm over six nights; there was also 16mm film of Elvis on tour, and some 8mm, too. But another unexpected find was the key to making EPiC the extraordinary proposition it is. ‘We also found never-before-heard audio of Elvis telling his story in his own words, which is really unusual,’ says Luhrmann, photographed here by Greg Williams when he was at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival, while premiering Elvis there.

‘Jono [Jonathan] Redman, who’s a producer on this, and my editor, and really my co-creator of this whole venture, said, “We’ve got to make something really special. We can’t just heat up the old documentaries. Can we do something unique?”’ Beyond the technical challenge of restoring the negative to a quality that would hold up on IMAX and syncing the sound, there was the unique opportunity to let Elvis speak in his own words – something fans had never heard before. ‘What we decided on was, rather than reheat old documentaries… What if we were to take this audio that we’d found, and Elvis will sing and tell his story in his own words? There have been many good documentaries, but they were always about other people talking about Elvis. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But sometimes you’ll get a guy who knew him for 10 minutes, having an opinion.’ In part, the lack of Presley speaking his own truth was down to how protective manager Colonel Tom Parker (portrayed by Tom Hanks in Baz’s film) was of Elvis. But if 2022’s Elvis told Parker’s version of events, EPiC tells Elvis’ side of the story. ‘Elvis comes to you, almost like in a dream, and he sings, and he tells his story in a way in which he’s never had the platform [for] before.’

Some of the footage in EPiC may have been glimpsed before, in black-and-white and bootleg snippets or from different takes or angles, but much of the material in the film is totally unseen, and certainly never with such clarity, offering an unprecedentedly intimate audience with an icon. ‘You will have never seen all of it reproduced at the level it is,’ asserts Luhrmann. ‘I can categorically tell you: there’s not a frame of AI or visual effects in this, other than the titles. The only visual effect in this movie is the visual effect Elvis has on his audience.’

With the images polished at Peter Jackson’s Park Road Post Production – where the Kiwi director memorably brought The Beatles: Get Back and Beatles ’64 to vibrant life – a huge challenge involved syncing the sound with the recovered film. ‘While we found all the pictures, it didn’t come with mag tape, which is how they used to record sound, right next to it,’ says Luhrmann. ‘What we were able to do, though, through meticulous research was to get second-generation audio sound. The audio isn’t different. While the picture is different when they strike a print – a work print, to cut and edit – the sound isn’t. So we were able to claw back the original vocal of Elvis and the band.’

Luhrmann has always been a pioneer when it comes to melding movies and music, and EPiC sees him push those instincts to new levels. Where the recording of the orchestra was inconsistent, he and his team rebuilt some of the backing music via scoring sessions. The film also moves between the actual sound you would’ve heard had you been in the room to remixes Luhrmann refers to as ‘DNA’, adding his trademark sparkle and oomph to the raw material. ‘It’s more than a documentary, and it’s not a concert film,’ he muses. ‘It’s actually an expression, I hope, of the essence, the spirit, and the character of Elvis through song and his words. It’s like a poem more than it is a linear expression of Elvis.’

And while Luhrmann refuses to speak on behalf of the King of Rock and Roll, he does say that he thinks he would appreciate ‘that he’s being heard and being presented visually and sonically in the best possible quality for the audience and the fans who he dearly loved’. Having worked to craft a big-screen, big-sound cinematic experience that makes viewers feel as though they’ve time-travelled to the International Hotel ballroom with Elvis, Luhrmann intends to get viewers moving, dancing as they did in 1970 and at TIFF when the film premiered. ‘What I hope is that we’ve created a truly theatrical experience, as close to being in the audience as possible.’