How bureaucratic Washington insider, Dick Cheney, quietly became the most powerful man in the world as vice president to George W. Bush, reshaping the country and the globe in ways that we still fe...
Vice depicts the "world's most powerful man" through unsuccessful distractions. I've come to the conclusion that me and Adam McKay just aren't ever going to get along. We're not, we are incompatible. His dramatic efforts consistently fall short, with 'The Big Short' being a tolerable piece of drama. Yet here we are with a biopic on Dick Cheney and how he rapidly became more and more powerful as he climbed up the governmental hierarchy. And much to my dismay (because I'll save you reading the rest of this review), I hated this.
There was a "comedic" scene halfway through where the film playfully ends abruptly by rolling the credits, and I found my blood physically boil. I started to sweat and breathe extremely heavily through frustration. It was at the moment, I found myself irritated by Vice. McKay undoubtedly was the wrong director for this biopic. The visual distractions, fourth wall breaks, onscreen annotations and constant narration detracted from what could've been a superior drama. McKay having wrote the screenplay, who's background mostly consist of comedies, was unable to solidify the narrative's tone. For example, when Cheney persuades president Bush to invade Iraq, the proceeding scene is a montage of war-torn clips accompanied by a booming classical number. McKay believes this to be powerful, but actually it comes across as pretentious. This entire biopic is so large in scope, yet every aspect of Cheney's life was underdeveloped and unsurprisingly dull. It almost felt like a dramatisation of Cheney's Wikipedia page. The constant "witty" narration that explains every flippin' political term and individual as if we know absolutely nothing. A biopic should be informative enough to allow the people to be engrossing. Vice just spews jargon from every direction, to a point where I thought I needed to bring a notepad. Its ferocity just makes the film forgettable and far too clinical.
Then we come to the treatment of Cheney and the viewpoint that McKay wanted to share. Throughout the entire film, it is heavily implied by Plemons' narration and McKay's introductory montage on how the world is now doomed, that Cheney is a bad individual. Every selfish action he took was just to improve his chances of becoming president. But, this is all diminished during the final scene when Cheney breaks the fourth wall and talks to us unintelligent viewers and spouts something like "You may hate me. But I did everything for my country. I protected the people I love.". Why? When you've spent over two hours depicting this individual to be a monster that you then decide to sit on the moral fence and leave the audience to decide if he was bad or good. That just sums up McKay in my opinion. Someone who needs to get off his high horse and stick to one tone, perspective and direction.
It completely frustrates me that a film like this falls short, when the performances are so brilliant. Bale, in all his method acting glory, packs on the pounds and transforms himself to become Cheney. He was outstanding. His voice, mannerisms and physicality were the perfect imitations of Cheney. Adams yet again gives a solid performance to which she will not win any awards (one day though...). Carell and Rockwell were decent, although did not have enough screen time to make a big enough impact. I would even go as far as saying there were various scenes, particularly after the methodically dull first half, that nearly captivated me. The outside meeting where Bush is chomping on chicken and Cheney is using his power of persuasion was a glimpse of excellence. But McKay wastes his cast for annoying gimmicks, uninspired direction and unimaginative storytelling that nearly made me walk out of the cinema. Such a waste!
