The 5 Best Music Biopics of All Time, According to Rotten Tomatoes

Music biopics are incredibly popular these days, with recent entries to the genre consisting of Timothée Chalamet’s turn as Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown and Rami Malek’s Oscar-winning performance as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody. With their blend of music and history, biopics are surefire ways to unite fans of music and cinema, and they’re certainly one-of-a-kind experiences, especially for major fans.

This trend doesn’t show any sign of slowing down, with a slate of four Beatles biopics starring Paul Mescal as Paul McCartney, Harris Dickinson as John Lennon, Barry Keoghan as Ringo Starr, and Joseph Quinn as George Harrison set to premiere simultaneously in April 2028. Still, according to Rotten Tomatoes, none of the biopics from the last few years quite hold up to some older classics. Read on to discover the top five music biopics of all time, according to Rotten Tomatoes.

1. What’s Love Got to Do With It (1993)
2. Funny Girl (1968)
3. The Pianist (2002)
4. Blaze (2018)
5. Behind the Candelabra (2013)

What’s Love Got to Do With It (1993)

Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer: 97%

1993’s What’s Love Got to Do With It tops the Rotten Tomatoes list with a 97% fresh score. The movie stars Angela Bassett as Tina Turner, and it follows her life story as she begins singing in a Tennessee church choir and makes her way to St. Louis. There, she meets Ike Turner, who launches her career while also subjecting her to escalating physical abuse throughout their marriage. 

Many reviewers praised Bassett and co-star Laurence Fishburne, who played Ike. Overall, the film moved critics with its triumphant tale of how Bassett’s Tina finds the bravery to break free from abuse and saves her own life, cementing her status as a legend in the process.

Funny Girl (1968)

Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer: 95%

Funny Girl stars Barbara Streisand as Fanny Brice, an iconic vaudeville performer who starred in the Ziegfeld Follies and was one of the early 20th century’s most iconic and beloved stars. Though she was already famous when she took the part, Streisand had her own unforgettable star turn in Funny Girl, and her performance remains the film’s most standout aspect. 

The movie follows Brice as she rises to fame and chronicles her struggles with husband Nicky Arnstein, whose imprisonment for bond theft inspires some of the film’s most unforgettable songs. Their relationship creates some of the central tension in Funny Girl, but of course, it’s ultimately Streisand’s star power and Brice’s legacy that drive this ship and continue to make Funny Girl such a beloved biopic.

The Pianist (2002)

Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer: 95%

Adrien Brody stars as a Jewish radio station pianist in this Oscar-winning film, which follows a decidedly different trajectory than the typical musician biopic. Brody plays Wladyslaw Szpilman, a real-life pianist whose autobiography of the same name inspired the film, and it tells the story of Szpilman’s journey as he is forced to move into the Warsaw Ghetto and later escapes deportation into the Treblinka extermination camp. It also follows him as he hides in the city and witnesses the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943.

Lauded for its devastating portrayal of the Holocaust's effect on one man's life, this movie is more of a portrait of a historical tragedy than a strictly music-focused biopic, but the silence that stems from Szpilman’s inability to play piano here is as loud as any song.

Blaze (2018)

Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer: 95%

Blaze Foley was a singer-songwriter whose troubled and colorful life is the basis of this renowned biopic. The film was adapted by Ethan Hawke, who based it on Sybil Rosen’s Living in the Woods in a Tree: Remembering Blaze Foley. It takes a non-linear approach to storytelling, showing scenes from Foley’s adventurous life in between clips of his last performance and an interview with his friends about his legacy. 

Foley remained relatively unknown during his life, but his songwriting was beloved by the likes of Townes van Zandt, John Prine, and Lucinda Williams, and his tracks, including “Clay Pigeons” and “If Only I Could Fly,” have been repurposed and covered by many modern artists. He lived a complex and wandering life before he was shot and killed during a dispute at age 39, but his legacy lives on in song—and on film.

Behind the Candelabra (2013)

Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer: 94%

Michael Douglas and Matt Damon star in this retelling of the real-life relationship between the pianist Liberace and his lover Scott Thorson, who was 40 years younger than the pianist when they met in 1976. Liberace was 57 while Thorson was between 16 and 18 years old, and their high-profile relationship caused quite a stir, particularly as Thorson descended into addiction and Liberace took other lovers. 

Thorson told his story in a 1988 memoir that inspired this film, and apparently the movie pleased him. “I think they were right on target,” he told Today of the film in 2013. “I'm just delighted; I'm overwhelmed.” Reviewers on Rotten Tomatoes agree, praising the performance of its leads and its nuanced depiction of complex themes.