ROCKETMAN is certainly the Dwight Stuff, a musical medley of the mercurial rise of Reggie Dwight and his metamorphosis into the music legend that is Elton John, the gifted musician, who set himself on a treadmill of fame and fortune and made himself change his name.

Far from a straight bio, ROCKETMAN launches into a musical phantasmagoria, where the songs are foundation blocks that play into the narrative.

Screenwriter Lee Hall, best known as the Academy Award nominated writer of Billy Elliott, has made the Dwight choice of fashioning a screenplay the flesh and bone of which is the essence of the subject – music and showmanship.

It’s a marvellous result, a marriage of fact and fantasy, a life lived like a candle in the wind, rarely knowing who to cling to when the rain sets in.

Fuelled by a stellar performance by Taron Egerton as Elton John, ROCKETMAN is propelled by a supporting cast that thrusts it into the stratosphere.

Jamie Bell as Bernie Taupin, Elton’s erstwhile lyricist, is the Brown Dirt Cowboy to the Captain Fantastic, stoic, loyal, steadfast and supportive.

Bryce Dallas Howard and Steven Mackintosh are acutely cool to the point of emotional frostbite as Reggie’s parents, while Gemma Jones’ grandma Ivy is an oasis of love and affection in a desert of Dwightful neglect.

Director Dexter Fletcher does a sterling “someone saved my life tonight” delivering a splendidly entertaining slice of cinematic razzle dazzle.

From Saturday Night’s All Right for Fighting to I’m Still Standing, ROCKETMAN is a joyous, cheeky celebration of a bona fide idol of popular culture – showman and shopaholic, singer and substance abuser, composer and promiscuous copulator – the candle is still burning as the legend ever will.

Not seen ROCKETMAN yet? To quote Elton and Bernie, “If there’s a god in heaven what are you waiting for?”