TV Entertainment News

Cadillac Records Review

Music biopics are nothing new; hell, just last year Judd Apatow mounted the comprehensive parody Walk Hard, which is a sure sign that the genre has officially cemented its conventions. As such, the success or failure of new ones is largely reliant upon the folks who bring them to life, regardless of the specific person or people whose lives they purport to document. Sometimes you get Walk the Line, a film that embodies the spirit of its subject and transcends the limitations of a recognizable story structure, and other times you get El Cantante, a hackneyed mess of clichés that does little justice to either its central figure or the expectations of its audience. Cadillac Records falls somewhere in between, albeit on the more rewarding end of that spectrum. A film about the rise of Chess Records, the label that helped popularize "race music" in a time of segregation, Darnell Martin's chronicle of the lives of Leonard Chess, Muddy Waters, Little Walter and others is a familiar tale of rags, riches and the ups and downs in between that survives thanks to the successful efforts of its talented cast and crew. (read more)