Cadillac Records Review

Friday, December 05, 2008 
Sergio A. Mims

 

CAST: Adrian Brody, Beyonce Knowles, Jeffrey Wright, Cedric the Entertainer, Eamonn Walker, Mos Def, Columbus Short, Gabrielle Union

WRITTEN AND DIRECTED by Darnell Martin

***1/2 THREE AND A HALF STARS

In this holiday movie season with all the attention and big guns focused on upcoming blockbusters starring Will Smith, Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Meryl Streep, filmgoers will be the losers if they overlook writer and director Darnell Martin’s exciting and wonderful new film Cadillac Records. This is the kind of film that restores your faith in the potential of black cinema and the fact that there are still incredible talents out there who know how to make films.

A vibrant, evocative work, Cadillac is steeped in the atmosphere of recording studios, big fin cars and dangerous men in their sharp fancy suits and processed hair carrying nickel plated ivory grip revolvers. It’s a love ode to the blues and rock and roll, black music born of tears, sorrow, pain and joy. To Martin’s credit, rather than succumb to a watered-down interpretation, a la Dreamgirls she gives this music its full due.

The film tells the story of Chess Records, the legendary music label based in Chicago, in existence from the early 50’s until the late 60’s. Chess was the first record company to bring black music out of its segregated classification as “race music” and into mass acceptability making the blues and rock and roll a worldwide force still resonating today.

It begins with Leonard Chess, a Polish Jewish immigrant (Brody) bar owner and devoted lover of the blues who goes into business creating the company with Mississippi bluesman Muddy Waters (Wright) as his first great star. Very quickly other important acts follow including Little Walter (Short), Willie Dixon (Cedric), Howling Wolf (Walker) and later Chess expands his roster bringing in Chuck Berry (Mos Def) and Etta James (Beyonce). The film then follows the course of Chess, his artists and the company’s trials and tribulations, until it folded following Chess’ death in 1969.

The film is heavily fictionalized, with real life situations changed around in order of chronology, no mention at all or any scenes involving Chess Records co founder and Leonard’s brother Phil, no scenes dealing with the company’s important history in jazz music, and even creating a fictitious affair between Etta James and Leonard, a story James herself says is pure fabrication.

None of that is damaging to the film. One gets so caught up with the details, nuances and story twists that one can easily forgive the inaccuracies.

Across the board, the performances in Cadillac are completely solid. Columbus Short is mesmerizing as the unstable, violent and self destructive Little Walter, and Mos Def, whose on-screen presence too often channels the sleepy, lazy persona of Stephin Fetchit, is funny and charismatic as Chuck Berry.

Acting honors without question go to Eamonn Walker, who is genuinely creepy and edgy as Howling Wolf, known as the most ferocious blues singer ever and Jeffrey Wright is stunning as the gravelly voiced, too rough around the edges, Muddy Waters. This is Wright’s most standout performance  since his breakout role in the 1996 film Basquiat and more than worthy of an Oscar nomination.

Of course the big question is Beyonce as the great Etta James and though she’s not certain for any thespian of the century awards, she is remarkably excellent as James. Singing her heart out, cussing up a storm and downright sexy, she lights up the screen and gives a totally convincing performance as the troubled singer.

Darnell Martin (one of the very few black female directors to direct a studio financed feature film), after years of directing episodic TV shows such as "Oz," "Law and Order" and "Life on Mars " and the TV movie Their Eyes Were Watching God, shows that all the years of experience directing television has given her a sharp eye and a keen understanding of pace and structure. The film moves with  stylish grace and there isn’t a single wasted moment or scene that goes wrong.

Cadillac Records is a terrific film that needs  to be seen not only for it’s great love of black music but simply because it’s a great film that deserves an appreciative audience desperate for good films.

Film critic, lecturer and festival consultant Sergio Mims covers all things film from the city that works, Chicago. He is a regular contributor to ebonyjet.com.