![]() ![]() (With the slight exception of the perfectly cast Mos Def as Chuck Berry, but he falls victim to too big a personality with too little screen time.) Everyone else in the movie is Wright’s backup band and they’re not very good. Nearly every time that Wright is off-screen in “Cadillac Records,” it’s low-grade melodrama, the kind of thing we’ve seen a hundred times before, at least half of them done more believably. She’s got the voice, for sure, but she just doesn’t have the screen presence to play as big a personality as the pipes behind “At Last”. First, Columbus Short feels forced as Little Walter, and, I’m sorry to be blunt, but I’m not buying what Beyonce Knowles tries to sell as Etta James. It’s when the Chicago label expands and the rest of the band starts to get their solos that “Cadillac Records” gets choppy. “Cadillac Records” starts strong because of Wright’s typically riveting performance, the main reason to rent or buy the film on Blu-Ray. Wright plays Muddy Waters and the first act of the film details his meeting Leonard Chess ( Adrien Brody) and their formation of Chess Records (nicknamed Cadillac Records because everyone who was on the label was successful enough to get a Caddy). The first story arc in “Cadillac Records” is easily the best because of the incredible Jeffrey Wright, one of the more consistently interesting actors of his generation. As soon as you get interested in one person’s story, writer/director Darnell Martin is sporadically moving on to another one. ![]() ![]() If each individual story in “Cadillac Records” causes young viewers to go back and learn more about the early days of rock and roll and the music of Etta James, Chuck Berry, Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Little Walter than the film will have done some good, but I’ll never understand the logic of trying to shove all their stories into a film under two hours long.Ĭadillac Records was released on Blu-Ray on March 10th, 2009. A frustratingly episodic film, “Records” crams too many stories into one movie, ending up more like a greatest hits album than a creative vision of its very own. CHICAGO – There’s a lot to like about the individual parts of “ Cadillac Records,” now on Blu-Ray, but they never come together to form a cohesive sum. ![]()
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