Christian’s transformation into Dick Cheney for the film Vice was a great effort, so much so that Bale is unrecognizable in the role. It also picked up the most number of nominations at the upcoming edition of Golden Globes in 2019. But, it looks like the film itself has divided critics and that doesn’t bode well for its future at the Oscars.
Variety noted in its review, “The Dick Cheney of Vice looks and talks and operates just like the Cheney we’re familiar with, but in terms of his underlying spirit he might as well be a kabuki figure. The audience, in trying to suss out his motivation, let alone (gulp!) his inner life, is forced to fall back on abstractions like ‘greed’ and ‘power’ and ‘a flagrant contempt for democracy,’ the sort of labels that add up to a liberal-left indictment but do little to explain, on a level of personal psychology, the crucial issue of how American right-wing patriotism got hijacked into something so corrupt.”
Forbes noted: “Adam McKay’s Vice is a seething condemnation of the damage done by the idea that certain folks (well-dressed white dudes of a certain class status) are offered a presumption of competence and expertise. Yet the movie, which itself is a cinematic mediocrity that is being hailed as a potential Oscar contender partially due to its subject matter and the established pedigree of its white male filmmaker. The contradiction doesn’t just validate the idea that movies about white dudes are automatically considered to be of greater critical value than acclaimed movies about white women and/or minorities. It also acts as a fascinating case-in-point for the movie’s core message. It’s a strange (intentional?) case of the film’s subtext being made text by virtue of aesthetic failure. That may make it an artistic win, but it’s still not very entertaining.”
