M, 2 hrs 13
mins
All cinemas
Review by ©
Jane Freebury
3 stars
Controversial
and reviled, American politician Dick Cheney is fair game for filmmaker Adam
McKay who had his say on bad corporate behaviour in The Big Short,
in 2015. Very entertaining it was too. A deft explanation of how the global
financial crisis came to pass, leaving us in no doubt about the amoral
behaviour in financial services that had such a big hand in it.
For former Saturday
Night Live writer, McKay, a natural satirist who knows exactly
how to take down anybody and anything, Cheney presents rich material.
Despite a
long career in politics - notably as a chief of staff, a former defence
secretary and a vice president - and a key role in US strategies leading
to and after the Iraq War, Cheney has apparently had little to say for himself.
Vice gleefully and unreservedly makes the
most of this with Christian Bale as Cheney, big as a whale, filling the screen.
However, little else emerges from this opaque political personality, who is
presented yet again as a shadowy space that others have become accustomed to
filling.
I went along
to Vice to get the goods, as I had in The Big Short.
Who was this man, committed Republican and Washington insider during the most
controversial and destructive period in recent US political history? On the man
and his view of the world, Vice offers scant insight.
Turning to
the internet, I found there was more to him. It's interesting to see that aside
from a penchant for pastries, a predisposition to heart attacks and getting
pulled over while driving under the influence when young, he has been elected
five times to the US House of Representatives.
In its
errors of omission, Vice would have us believe that Cheney was a bit of
a no-hoper, a no-hoper with an ambitious wife. Someone who somehow or other
struck it lucky after he failed at Yale (twice actually), after which he took a
job as a linesman, before he proceeded, inexplicably, to an internship in the
US administration.
Actually,
Cheney has two degrees in political science, and was once registered for a
doctorate. His formidable wife Lynne, played here by Amy Adams, went on to get
hers, and has subsequently written a raft of books on American history.
Coy
disclaimers at the start of Vice, that they did their ‘f----ing best’ to
present the facts, only sidesteps the issue of omission here.
Entertaining
and audacious it is, with a brave central performance from Bale (also in The
Big Short) as the dubious ideologue and with terrific support from Adams as
his wife and Steve Carrell as Donald Rumsfeld. Much of the early low-angle
camerawork ensures that everyone looks their least attractive. While Sam
Rockwell, apparently without any prosthetic at all, nails it as George W Bush.
So who, in
an unfortunate sign of these times, wants to complain when a film is this
entertaining? It depends on what you are looking for.
Ultimately, Vice,
in the style of broad brush cartoon, rehearses the widely held view that
Cheney is an opaque politician, a behind-the-scenes operator who is
insufficiently accountable. We have been aware of this reputation for a long time so more
insight into his way of thinking, his world view, would have been welcome.
I thought
that in the era of fake news we were all agreed that the facts must matter
again. So, what has happened here?
Also published at Jane's blog , the Film Critics Circle of Australia (critics voices), and broadcast on
ArtSound FM 92.7
