Cadillac Records tells an interesting story in the most uninteresting of ways. Segregation is the norm and, oddly, it would take a Jewish Polish immigrant and a wealth of black recording artists to slowly chip away at the barrier. Adrien Brody plays Leonard Chess whose rocky trip to the top starts with a nightclub in a Negro neighborhood. His paths cross with a poor sharecropper by the name of Muddy Waters played by Jeffrey Wright, who looks more like Billy Dee Williams than the blues musician. In Waters, Chess finds the star he needs to hitch a ride on and founds Chess Records. Soon, he’s attracting other talents such as Little Walter (Columbus Short), Chuck Berry (Mos Def), Howlin’ Wolf (Eamonn Walker), and Etta James (Beyonce Knowles).
Beyonce (who also served as executive producer) definitely has the pipes to match the legendary James and the audience I was with erupted in applause when she crooned, “At Last.” However, try as she might, she didn’t have the acting chops to match the larger-than-life personality that came with the larger-than-life voice.
It’s never clear whether Chess is truly taking care of his artists or ripping them off. Nonetheless, the label is riding the gravy train. While the stars may be raking in the dough and driving fancy Cadillacs, they still can’t eat the same places as white folks. Matter of fact, Berry is thrown out of a club he’s booked to play because the owners mistakenly believed he was white. He also causes a near riot simply by dancing with white girls on stage. Mos Def has a lot of fun with the role, but he's not in the film nearly enough. I'm all for spinning him off into a full-length film.
The film is narrated by Willie Dixon (Cedric the Entertainer) and uses Chess and Waters as the focal points, but no one personality is the centerpiece. Characters weave in and out of the story. Thus, Cadillac Records feels like several musical biopics strung together with each one following the typical trajectory of other biopics such as Ray or Walk the Line. It’s a formula that was mocked so well in Dewey Cox. The artists struggle with finances, drugs, and infidelity. They have their inevitable fall from grace before newfound fame pulls them back into the spotlight. Writer/Director Darnell Martin (whose body of art has primarily been in television) fashioned a script that leans just a little too much towards fiction rather than fact. She has added a few speculated romances (Chess & James, Little Walter and Waters' 1st wife) to spice things up.
There isn’t anything particularly terrible with Cadillac Records, but there isn’t anything particularly spectacular. It’s more noteworthy as a soundtrack rather than a film. A recommended rental.
Rating: ** 1/2
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