Review of the documentary “Milli Vanilli” by Luke Corem

The Paramount+ platform released the documentary film “Milli Vanilli” by Luke Corem, which tells about the biggest scandal in the history of show business of the 20th century. I remembered songs that were not sung by those who danced in Milli Vanilli videos Igor Gavrilov.

American director Luke Corem loves making films about adventurers. His previous feature film Dealt was a biography of blind card magician Richard Turner, and his series Action focused on the legalization of sports betting in the United States. Show business in Luke Corem’s film “Milli Vanilli” is also a game of chance; the players here are German producer Frank Farian (Boney M, Milli Vanilli, No Mercy) and his charges – Rob Pilatus and Fab Morvan. And the casino in the new film is the world of large music corporations, and, naturally, it always wins.

Fabrice Morvan is a Parisian. At the age of 18, he moved to Munich and lived at the station for two weeks until he met another dancer, Robert Pilatus, at a party. They were noticed by Frank Farian, one of the most famous German music producers, creator of the disco group Boney M. Frank Farian offered them a contract, which, as usual, they signed without reading.

According to Fab Morvan, on behalf of whom the story is told, it was a huge disappointment for his comrade when he learned that in the new group Milli Vanilli they were only invited to dance and open their mouths to pre-recorded vocal parts. Rob Pilatus even wanted to return Farian’s advance. At the same time, Farian’s accountant and mistress Ingrid Segit claims on camera that there was no talk of any return of the advance; the guys immediately agreed to sing along with the soundtrack. The viewer will not know how it really happened. Frank Farian refused to star in the film.

Milli Vanilli did not just perform to a soundtrack. In 1988, with the release of the song “Girl You Know It’s True”, they became the most popular pop group in the world. However, Frank Farian did not even try to teach them to sing. From the very beginning, he entrusted this task to the Americans – vocalist Brad Howell and rapper Charles Shaw.

Milli Vanilli is a long film, and yet Luke Corem doesn’t show all the pitfalls. It doesn’t say, for example, that “Girl You Know It’s True” not only wasn’t sung by Rob and Fab, but wasn’t even written by Frank Farian. Its authors are the American group Numarx. And Brad Howell recorded vocals for another important German disco group – Chilly.

For Luke Corem, popular music is one big bluff with ever-increasing stakes. The point of no return for the entire Milli Vanilli project was the decision of band manager Todd Headley to nominate Milli Vanilli for a Grammy. By this time, the fact that Milli Vanilli were phonographists was already known far beyond Frank Farian’s studio. The American record label Arista, which released their records in the USA, also knew about this. The head of Arista, Clive Davis, the great producer who discovered Whitney Houston to the world, was also aware. But the group’s debut album had already brought in $560 million. And the American publishers Milli Vanilli decided not to slow down, although the risk that everything would turn into a scandal was very high.

It is interesting to watch how all the show industry managers interviewed by Luke Core look away and in every possible way convince the director that they are not to blame for what happened with Milli Vanilli. It’s nobody’s fault. And yet, everyone understood that if the group won a Grammy, it would be the end of it.

In the Best New Artist category, Milli Vanilli competed against the Indigo Girls, Neneh Cherry, Soul II Soul and Tone Lok – people who made their own music and recorded their voices. And they won. When Paul McCartney decided to congratulate them backstage at the ceremony, Rob Pilatus simply did not let him into the dressing room, saying: “Later!”

Milli Vanilli showed a full range of symptoms of star fever. In the end, according to Brad Howell, Rob Pilatus believed that it was he who sang on the recording, and in interviews he said that Milli Vanilli was better than The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. Rob Pilatus and Fab Morvan’s desire to record their own vocals for Milli Vanilli’s second album led to disaster. Nobody needed this – neither Frank Farian, nor Clive Davis, nor, by and large, the public, for whom the most important thing was how Milli Vanilli looked, and not who sang there. As a result of the conflict between the band and the producer, Frank Farian made an official statement that the dancers Pilatus and Morvan did not make a sound during Milli Vanilli. And he wouldn’t be Frank Farian if he didn’t immediately turn the situation to his advantage. He released the album “The Moment Of Truth” by a group called The Real Milli Vanilli. It featured the real-life singers of the Girl You Know It’s True album… as well as a couple of other characters Frank Farian hired simply because they looked good. Why give up the old tricks if they work?

Frank Farian, of course, deserves his own biopic, and a live-action one at that. This could be a film about the combination of unconditional musical talent and the passion of a player who does not admit defeat.

The central figure in Luke Corem’s film is Rob Pilatus. A guy who survived domestic violence and suffered from ADHD, a handsome man with green eyes, obsessed with justice. Perhaps the most powerful scene in the film is the Milli Vanilli press conference where Rob Pilatus apologizes to fans. At this moment, he takes the rap for the entire show business, built on deception and hypocrisy.

Rob Pilatus died in Frankfurt in 1998, the morning after returning from a rehabilitation clinic. Fab Morvan lives with his family in Amsterdam and has four children. He performs with his band and does not regret anything related to Milli Vanilli.