Cadilliac Records - Chess Records Gets The Bio Pic Treatment

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Cadillac Records tells the story of the influential blues and rock label Chess Records.  Founded by Leonard Chess in 1947, he helped popularize blues and desegregate popular music.  Chess (played by Adrien Brody) is a somewhat shady character.  He’s not above a little payola in order to get a record played.  Nor is he averse to signing his artists to sketchy record deals.

Chess’ first discovery is Muddy Waters (played by Jeffrey Wright).  Waters leaves sharecropping in Mississippi in order to follow his passion for music.  He quickly meets up with soon-to-be legendary harmonica player Little Walter (Columbus Short).  And then the hits just keep on comin.’

Cadillac Records is a fun but seriously flawed film.  It falls into the same trap that so many music based biopics do and ends up becoming a collection of scenes rather than a cohesive story.  There are parts of the movie that feel as if they’ve already been parodied by last year’s Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.  One of Walk Hard’s best gags was how Dewey would meet famous people and they’d always introduce themselves using their full names and some sort of identifier: “Hi, I’m Ringo Starr of The Beatles.”  There’s a scene where The Rolling Stones stop by the Chess Studios that is present for no other reason than to say (nay, scream), “ Hey look, The Rolling Stones liked these guys.”

The film is basically sequential anecdotes and, I would guess, many of them apocryphal.  At one point, Little Walter shoots an impersonator in the middle of the street in broad daylight and simply drives away.  The incident is never mentioned again.  The movie also hints at an affair between Etta James (Beyoncé Knowles) and Leonard Chess that apparently has no basis in fact.  Taken on its own, Cadillac Records would make one think that there were only four artists on Chess Records: Muddy Waters, Little Walter, Etta James and Howlin’ Wolf (Eamonn Walker).  I understand the need for truncation.  The movie already short shrifts everyone’s story in order to hit its hour and forty-five minute running time.  But to not even mention artists like Buddy Guy, John Lee Hooker or Bo Diddley feels somewhat hypocritical.  It seems disingenuous for a film whose central conceit is that the work of Waters, Walter, Wolf and James has been glossed over by pop culture.

Good performances abound in the film. Jeffery Wright gives a star turn as Muddy Waters.  And if Mos Def’s acting career ever tanks, he could make a nice living touring as a Chuck Berry impersonator.  His performance is so strong that it makes you wish they had spun him off into a Chuck Berry picture.  His protrayal of Berry is full of humor and charm that we rarely see from the actual Berry these days.  And from what little we do see of Berry’s story, it becomes fairly evident as to why those traits have faded over time.  Eamonn Walker is also fascinating as Howlin’ Wolf.  And, of course, there’s Beyonce as Etta James.  While some critics are raving, her performance isn't drastically different from her role in Dreamgirls.  And, like Dreamgirls, it seems like much her acting is centered on her singing.

Cadillac Records is an enjoyable but somewhat crudely assembled picture.  There are some fun moments and it goes without saying that the soundtrack is wonderful.  But, ultimately it feels as if an opportunity was wasted.  The actors were game but the screenplay lets them down with what feels less like an A-list movie and more like a reenactment of an episode of Behind The Music. 

On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being Ray and 1 being Josie And The Pussycats, Cadillac Records gets a 6.

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