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In his screen biography, “Better Man,” he uses a CGI version to demonstrate he was “less evolved” than other singers and didn’t fit it. Thus, the conceit.

Watching a monkey (a CGI monkey) go through the stages of stardom is awfully fun, but the idea doesn’t always hold up. At some point, Williams should have felt accepted and in the same arena as other music stars. He could regress, for example, but we should have gotten something other than a haircut to make this concept seem like more than a gimmick.

Thankfully, Williams’ narration is spiked with snark. He isn’t afraid to call out those who were less than generous to him and, in the film’s over-arching theme, tries to make sense of a father who left the family to pursue his own degree of stardom.

“Better Man” bursts with music and helps audiences understand Williams in a way that a straight biography couldn’t.

Director Michael Gracey approaches this with Williams’ irreverence and gets more connection between reality and celebrity than you might imagine.

Getting a monkey (played in a motion-capture suit by Jonno Davies) to go through the stages of pop stardom is just as fun as tweaking Al Yankovic’s life in “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.” The film isn’t afraid to thump his life as a teen idol in Take That. But it also doesn’t hesitate to talk about drugs and alcohol in a way that Amy Winehouse’s biography never could.

The film moves much faster than Williams’ career ever did. It propels him from one situation to another in record time and retains a love for family and pop idols (he was enamored with Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr.) that makes this supremely honest.

Without the monkey gimmick, “Better Man” probably wouldn’t have sold. There isn’t enough surprise in Williams’ story to merit the full-Elton. But giving it a goose, as Williams did with many talk show appearances, makes it highly interesting and less dependent on the actual story.

While someone could have said something about the way he looks, the situation suggests acceptance in a way that Williams never embraced.

Laughs — some raunchy — abound in the film and, if you listen closely, some of the longings edge particularly close to the heart.

“Better Man” is a fun film — one that doesn’t rely on particulars but insists you care about the one who did it his way. The biggest surprise is what kind of impact something like this will have on Williams' career.