The new documentary, in theaters this December, finally lets fans see one of the greatest pop tours ever
George Michael was in the midst of pulling off a stunning coup at the start of 1988. Already a proven hitmaker as one half of Wham!, he’d just released his debut solo album, Faith, including the provocative, ultra-catchy hits “Faith,” “Father Figure,” and “I Want Your Sex.” By the time he launched his first solo tour, in Tokyo that February, he was inarguably one of the biggest stars in the world. “I really think that anyone who doesn’t like anything on my new album has no right to say they like pop music,” Michael, 24, said that year in his first Rolling Stone cover story. The new film George Michael: The Faith Tour was shot on 35mm at two performances in Paris that spring, and the footage was long considered lost — until now. Here are some of the most striking images from the film, which arrives in theaters later this year. Tickets are on sale now.
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Listen Up
Image Credit: Michael Putland/Getty Images George Michael listens to a Walkman while riding a bullet train during the Japanese leg of his Faith World Tour in February 1988.
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Gotta Have Faith
Image Credit: Michael Putland Filmmakers Andy Morahan (who directed the original music videos for “Faith,” “Father Figure,” and “I Want Your Sex,” along with many other hits) and David Austin (a close lifelong friend and collaborator of Michael) carefully restored the 1988 concert footage that appears in the film.
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Father Figure
Image Credit: Michael Putland Screenings will begin with a short film directed by Mary McCartney, drawing on unheard interview audio and more. A live album from the Faith tour is also on the way.
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Behind the Camera
Image Credit: Michael Putland “As you can see in the new trailer for The Faith Tour, his confidence was raging — night after night, he faced a crowd of strangers and sang the line, ‘If you ever hunger, hunger for me,’ making everyone in the room hear it as a personal demand,” Rolling Stone‘s Rob Sheffield recently wrote. “For once, and only once, he was willing to live up to every crazed fantasy the world had about George Michael — and that includes his own secret fantasies about himself.”
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It Takes a Strong Man, Baby
Image Credit: Chris Cuffaro “He never tried this kind of spectacle again, and never preserved it in a proper concert film or album,” Sheffield wrote. “So it’s been easy to overlook, even though his story has been told and retold so many times over the years. Pop fans know Faith inside out, but almost nobody has seen the way he brought it to life every night onstage.”
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Two Legends
Image Credit: Chris Cuffaro Michael’s Faith tour setlist included covers of some of his favorite Seventies soul songs, as well as “I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me),” his 1987 duet with Aretha Franklin (shown here with him).
