Dir. Darnell Martin, US, 2008, 108 mins
Cast: Adrien Brody, Jeffrey Wright, Beyoncé Knowles
Review by Carol Allen
Unless you're either a fan of R n' B or old enough to remember the fifties and sixties, this film may be unknown music history to you. It's the story of Chess Records, its founder, Polish immigrant Leonard Chess (Brody) and the artists he introduced into mainstream popular music, including Muddy Waters (Wright), who was idol and inspiration to the Rolling Stones, and Chuck Berry (Mos Def), the first of the Chess stable to cross over and appeal to the wider white audience and whose music arguably marks the birth of rock and roll.
It's a colourful story with lots of foot tapping music, though not always as clearly told as it might be. It also takes its time about making plain to us who the characters are and what makes them tick, and is hindered in this by the strong accents and hip slang used by the Black artists, which for many makes much of the dialogue difficult to follow. The storytelling is also, until some way into the film, somewhat episodic without a sense of central narrative. All does however with patience become clear as you get drawn into the story and it's worth the effort.
Brody's role as the father figure of Chess, who regards his artists as his family and adopts a sometimes unwise paternalistic authority and Wright's as Muddy are both initially written somewhat sketchily, but both actors have the weight to carry us through and Wright in particular is impressive as Muddy, whose love of booze and other women puts his marriage to Geneva (Gabrielle Union) in jeopardy. Other legendary names who contribute to the story are the volatile, loud-mouthed Little Walter (Columbus Short) and the intense and rather scary Howlin' Wolf (Eamonn Walker).
The title of the movie comes from the Cadillac cars, which become success symbols for the Chess artists. Interestingly considering the era it's not until fairly late in the film that the spectre of racism raises its ugly head, when Def as Chuck Berry is thrown out of a gig he's booked to play because of his colour. Def is delightfully funny and cute in the role, though his downfall, when he is arrested and jailed for his involvement with an under-age girl, is rather unsatisfactorily skimmed over. One does get the impression that the filmmakers are trying to cram so much incident and history into the film that they haven't given themselves enough space to really explore the characters. It's not until Beyoncé comes onto the scene as the disturbed, unstable and golden voiced Etta James that we get any serious emotional involvement and drama. Her performance both as actress and singer is one of the highlights of this film. She also acted as an executive producer on the movie, presumably out of her passion for the project, which despite its flaws is still an inspiring celebration of this important period in the development of popular music and Black led culture.
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