Review of Vice (2018) by Axet — 07 Feb 2019

Good but over-rated in the dopey media! Yes Christian Bale is great and worthy of the praise, as is the surprisingly creative energetic stylistic filmmaking and form it takes. At the same time that form is sloppy and uneven going naturalistic at times, broad comedy at others with its slacker humor randomly transposed on the serious content while obvious big jokes (Dick shooting friend on hunting trip) are glossed over and totally blown. Sloppy too with period flaws (texts were not in wide use in the U.S. until 2004).

Note to Mr. writer/director: Whatever Cheney's sins, his final monologue to camera is the most truthful bit of your movie, ironically. You are not being cleverly transparent and even handed by ending with it, but actually foiling your own liberal bias. It's good you included that bit of truth, it just doesn't fit the film you just made! Then far worse you idiotically blemish the entire film with your dumb over-the-top contrived focus group slapstick about "facts" button. Fool, facts are many and usually interpretive and of course selective, ESPECIALLY in a highly editorialized just over two hour movie! Oliver Stone who's done far more, far better similar fare would never stoop to such SNL style antics, but that's to be expected based on your past work.