Vice
Adam McKay’s “Vice” feels like a parody of a biopic rather than a successful example of the form. That is a damn shame because, regardless of whatever side of the political spectrum you sit, the life and career of Dick Cheney is one of the most important ones in American history, and is ripe for being told on the big screen. It’s the way McKay, who had so deftly navigated the build-up to the financial crisis of 2008 in “The Big Short,” tells it here that is problematic.
The most important thing to know about Dick Cheney is that, from the time he became a Congressional intern in the late ‘60s, he was infatuated by power. As a part of the Nixon and Ford White Houses, he saw the power of the President be challenged in profound ways, and he chased it in a myriad of ways leading to his time spent in the administrations of both Bushes. He also saw Presidents afraid to challenge the norms of their offices until he had an opening arrive in his selection by George W. Bush as his running mate in 2000. His proximity to the office allowed him a chance to test a theory that, if the President does something, it must be legal because it’s the President did it. The resulting eight years of Bush-Cheney altered the power of the presidency in ways we are still witnessing the impact of on a daily basis.
This is an absolutely loaded cast, with Christian Bale as Dick and Amy Adams as his wife, Lynne, headlining as Steve Carrell (as Donald Rumsfeld, the future Secretary of Defense with whom Cheney begins his political career with as an intern) and Sam Rockwell (as Dubya) in support. They all do solid work, given what they are asked to do, but it feels like what they are asked to do is less dig into the characters they play, and more play each role as a caricature. That’s the biggest reason why “Vice” doesn’t work- while I understand that McKay is a bit hamstrung by Cheney’s secrecy, his direction of his cast is so broad it feels less like a well-calibrated look at pending disaster (a la “The Big Short”) and more like his comedies such as “Anchorman” or “Talladega Nights” or “The Campaign,” only without the laughs. Technically, there are some ways McKay uses cinematography and editing to almost poke fun at the biopic (which I like), and the idea of doing one on one of the most controversial figures in American politics, but that only illustrates how out of his depths he feels with this film. At least with “The Big Short” he seemed to take his subject seriously. In “Vice,” he leans into the liberal view of Cheney as a cartoon villain a little too much. Love him or hate him (I’m in the latter), his life deserves a better film if we are to understand him better.
