Vice, the spectacular new film from writer/director Adam McKay, is such a sucker-punch that you can feel the sly presence of everyone involved who collaborated on this motion picture, in every frame. It’s big, it’s sprawling, it’s wickedly clever, and it’s extremely funny. But, what’s most disturbing is that at no point should you ever be laughing about what Dick Cheney, so incredibly realized for the screen by the magnificent Christian Bale, has done to the world we all inhabit.
This isn’t a traditional biopic; McKay is too smart and progressive for that staid approach.
So you get a non-linear structure, tons of fourth-wall-breaking moments that are utterly divine, sardonic voice-over, the intersection of the voice-over into the narrative, a false-ending, and everything in-between.
It’s a MOVIE spelled out all in caps, and in love with the manner in which the story is being told.
I shall spoil no more of the fun in terms of McKay’s wild-man aesthetic decisions, and in tandem with the whip-fast and info-packed screenplay, this is clearly a companion piece to the director’s previous picture, The Big Short, a similarly smart-assed and brilliant piece of topical storytelling; I wonder if there’ll be a third movie to complete some sort of unofficial, sociopolitical cinematic trilogy.
Financed by Megan Ellison’s Annapurna Pictures, a studio which has become known for fully supporting their filmmaker’s intended artistic vision, Vice features a roll-call of amazing acting talent, everyone clearly relishing the chance to play despicable, Masters of the Universe assholes that helped to shape the world stage that we all get to observe with disgust and sadness. It takes someone with true nerve to derive any sense of humor out of the callousness that Cheney operated with.
Bale is absolutely mesmerizing as Cheney, all fatted-up and looking like complete dog-shit, on the verge of a heart attack at any moment (he looks like current-stage Russell Crowe in a couple of instances). In fact, one of the films best running jokes is how Cheney personally responded to each of his coronary traumas. Amy Adams is bracingly nasty as Lynne Cheney, etching a portrait of a beyond-driven woman who never felt wrong about sacrificing her morals to achieve a specific end-result.
Steve Carell has toothy fun as Donald Rumsfeld, while also managing to sneak some small grace notes into a very conflicted character. And Sam Rockwell delivers the definitive screen portrayal of George W. Bush; he steals every single scene, and just you wait for him acting with his chicken wings – it’s the best bit of on-screen eating and performing since Robert De Niro and his sandwich in 1997’s Copland.
Cinematographer Greig Fraser (Killing them Softly, Lion, Zero Dark Thirty, Foxcatcher, Rogue One) continues his insane hot-streak with some aggressively stylish work, mixing formats, film-speeds, and visual motifs, creating a hodge-podge mosaic feeling to the entire picture; my guess is that Oliver Stone will appreciate all of the formal business being thrown around in Vice.
Hank Corwin’s rough-house editing is in perfect tandem with Nicholas Britell’s varied musical score, and I love how this film announces its intentions right up front, and essentially says “Fuck You” if you don’t like it. And then come the devastating final moments, with Bale delivering a straight-to-camera monologue that sends a shiver down your spine – because you know it to be the ugly truth.
Review by Nick Clement
Summary
Caustically entertaining, remarkable in presentation and form, and hoisted up by Bale’s superlative skills as a full-immersion actor, Vice is easily one of my favorite movies of the year.
