Ryan McNeil
As the story of Dick Cheney comes to its conclusion, the titular Vice starts to monologue right out through the fourth wall. He expresses no regrets, and doubles-down on how far he went in the name of patriotism. The scene leads to a throwaway moment mid-credits where a man in a focus group is calling out a film for its unfair liberal bias.
Both scenes are designed to elicit a reaction from viewers. Somehow I get the feeling my reaction was different from those of Oscar voters.
VICE is nominated for eight Oscars, most notably Best Actor, Best Director, and Best Picture. How all of this happened this year is somewhat beyond me. All three categories have so many worthy nominees left on the sidelines, and it’s not like VICE was last-man-in in any of the groups. A film that gets one or two accolades executed one or two things well and was lauded specifically; a film that gets this many nods has built consensus.
VICE is about the life and times of Dick Cheney. It follows him from his days interning with the Nixon administration all the way through his first term as Vice President of The United States. We are told of his beliefs about the American structure of power, and how it has left itself open to interpretation. All of it is told with a shit-eating grin, in a way that seems designed to make liberals laugh and conservatives seethe.
The film doesn’t stand much of a chance in categories like Best Picture and Best Director, so for the most part its nominations will stand as its awards. However, Christian Bale does fare a decent shot at taking Best Actor for his portrayal of the titular “Vice”.
Bale does what Bale has made his career doing: he disappears into the role. He put on weight and learned a snarl and shed all semblance of humanity to embody a deplorable person. Not only is he leaning on old tricks to earn himself new accolades, but he is doing it in such a weak year for the category that he could well take the gold doing it.
To be clear, Christian Bale isn’t doing a bad job as Dick Cheney…he’s just not exactly pushing himself either.
One of these days, someone is going to need to explain to me why Hollywood has such a deep fascination with telling and retelling the story of the Bush/Cheney administration. With half of the story taking place in this century, it’s not like McKay is telling people much they don’t already know. In the age of the 24-Hour News Cycle, it’s not enough to say “Bush was dim and Cheney was diabolical”. One must, as the iconic newsman once said, “go deeper”
At the end of the day, I’m left wondering who this film is for and how it became so lauded in this year’s Oscar class. Conservative filmgoers will hate it because it skewers one of their leaders, and liberal filmgoers will hate it because it doesn’t do anything new or say anything original. McKay has quickly slotted himself a space on the multiplex marquee as a man who wants to tell real stories in a way that combines definition and dickishness.
The problem is, when he leans too hard on the latter, the film’s legacy becomes something rather off-putting. The only hope is that Oscar voters soon stop rewarding films with this sort of legacy, and look around for more compelling stories that we don’t all know inside and out.
VICE continually comes back to metaphoric imagery of a fisherman as it goes about telling its tale. Using this analogy, it’s a shame that Oscar voters took the bait, and couldn’t tell the difference between what was nourishment…and what was something shiny luring it to bite.