What do you do when it’s all over? Not just a badly paraphrased Elton John lyric, this is the question that Louis Tomlinson’s documentary sets out to answer right at the start. More than a story of fighting for success against all odds, ‘All Of Those Voices’ is a love letter to the people who made his career what it is today.
Rewinding the clock from Louis’ triumphant show at London’s O2 Shepherds Bush Empire last December to his televised X-Factor audition in 2010 (after declaring “I hope it doesn’t make any part of this movie” in ‘This Is Us’, this time his audition performance is not shown), the film opens with a rapid-fire rollercoaster of emotions.
We see the immediate success of One Direction at odds with the heartache of not being featured on the band’s early singles, achieving more songwriting credits than any of his bandmates is juxtaposed against not being prepared – or even feeling any sense of closure – when the group took their hiatus. All of this occurs in the space of about ten minutes.
What happened next is the story this documentary was created to tell. Through loss and love, both personal and professional, this is – as Louis declared when the film release was announced – “my story with you in my own words.”
‘All Of Those Voices’ is a story of love and family – both the kind you grow up with and the kind you find for yourself. If grief is love with nowhere left to go, this documentary is Louis’ way of expressing that. Heartfelt conversations with family at home in Doncaster pay tribute to the life and legacy of the family he’s lost, while humorous conversations to camera on the road honour the family that’s been found along the way.
