The Bodyguard (1992) stars Kevin Costner (from Waterworld) as an ex secret service bodyguard called Frank Farmer who has previously protected multiple presidents before leaving to earn more money in the private sector protecting celebrities. This movie begins with him being convinced to take on the job of protecting a bit of a diva – a famous singer & actress called Rachel Marron in this movie, who is actually played by the real Whitney Houston, in her late 20s here – this was her first movie and was a massive box office success.
The soundtrack album to this movie was an even bigger success – to this day it remains the best-selling movie soundtrack album of all time, as well as the best-selling album by any female ever (according to Wikipedia, which doesn’t cover undisclosed history & territories).
Whitney’s character is initially quite reckless, as are most of her team, while Kevin’s character is trying to organise security in a necessarily pedantic manner. So initially they don’t click, but they eventually come to appreciate each other and become romantically involved. This is well timed, since there’s a very real threat to the celebrity’s life in the form of a clever & careful stalker.
I rate this movie as OK. It’s quite fun and captivating if you’ve not seen it before and are a fan of the lead cast members as well as the core concept and genre of this movie. Execution is a bit old-fashioned – it’s a bit of an old drama, and it goes on for 2 hours, but is generally well made, and there’s still a healthy dose of intermittent action in it.
Before knowing it was Whitney playing the lead female in this movie, I was thinking she has a confident sleepy-smokey eyed gaze very similar to Zhilei Zhang’s boxing trainer, Shaun George. They have very similar eyes.
The suspiciously similar deaths of Whitney and her only child
Sadly, Whitney died in her bathtub in 2012, aged only 48. Allegedly due to accidental downing, with cocaine a contributing factor. Her only child, Bobbi Kristina Brown, also died in a bathtub, just 3 years later, in 2015, aged only 22, allegedly due to cocaine and alcohol. Nick Gordon, Whitney’s adopted son, and eventual boyfriend of Bobbi, was held liable for Bobbi’s death in 2017, then died of a heroine overdose himself in 2020, aged 30.