Vice (2018)

[AimingforYoko]

Quote

The story of Dick Cheney, an unassuming bureaucratic Washington insider, who quietly wielded immense power as Vice President to George W. Bush, reshaping the country and the globe in ways that we still feel today.

I appreciated McKay resisting the urge to make Cheney a cartoon. He was a man. He loved his wife, he loved his daughters. He was just a man who did some really, really heinous shit. Actually his wife and Rumsfeld came off far worse.

I can see how some of the McKay flourishes (breaking the fourth wall, the mystery narrator, the fake ending) would annoy some people, I happened to like them quite a bit. Great performances all around, one of my favorites of the year.

 

Edited December 26, 2018 by AimingforYoko

[annzeepark914]

We saw this movie yesterday & loved it. The fake ending was clever as it allowed them to introduce the next section of his career in a very dramatic way. It wasn't boring despite the # of administrations he worked for. Excellent casting and, of course, the disappearance of Christian Bale into Cheney shows what a great actor he is.  I've heard that, in person, Cheney really comes across as one bad dude.

[GHScorpiosRule]

I'm totally going to see it either tomorrow or this weekend. As I've stated elsewhere, I hate the man this movie is about, but I LOVE Christian Bale. I'm totally his BITCH, and the short preview I did see earlier, he's just fucking AMAZING. I'm going for him.

[tennisgurl]

The acting in this movie was seriously top notch all around. I also enjoyed all the directorial quirks (fake ending, narrator, guessing what happened when no one knows for sure) and the way it played with narrative structure. And it’s downright uncanny how much Bale really sinks into Cheney. He humanizes him, and doesn’t play him like a mustache twirling villain, while also getting across his sketchy, amoral nature. 

[MsNewsradio]

Loved the performances, and Bale deserves every accolade thrown his way, but the film overall I found to be scattershot and underwhelming. There were good ideas there but I don't think it fully coalesced into what it could be. 

[snickers]

I saw this today, I really enjoyed it, I think it might be the best one of award contenders I've seen so far (i.e. the Favourite, Green Book, Roma, A Star is Born)....I don't think I've ever seen an Adam McKay film but now I want to see others....I personally think C.Bale should get oscar gold for this, but I'm not holding my breath....while I don't think this was Amy Adam's best role I thought she was pretty solid.

 

I don't think there was anything I didn't like about this movie....from the fake ending to the way they used the narrator to the dinner scene with Alfred Molina

 

Did anyone notice that was Noami Watts playing the Fox News Anchor? LOL

[kiddo82]

23 minutes ago, snickers said:

Did anyone notice that was Noami Watts playing the Fox News Anchor? LOL

I saw that and at first I felt a pang because someone of Naomi Watts' talent really deserves better than 30 seconds of playing a no name Fox news Anchor but then I realized it was 30 seconds of Alfred Molina at the dinner scene.  Then I also remembered the very brief cameos in the Big Short too so maybe that's just something that McKay does.

[GHScorpiosRule]

I just got back from seeing this and DAMNED if Bale didn’t nail Cheney. He fucking scared the bejesus out of me and there were moments I forgot that was Bale. 

I know I wasn’t thrilled when I heard Tyler Perry was going to play Powell, but he impressed me and did a solid job in the few scenes he was in. The weak link for me was Steve Carell as Rumsfeld. It just wasn’t believable. Rumsfeld is another scary guy and here Carell just had him laughing like a loon and idiot-and not the evil shrewd asshole he is.

I can’t decide if Lynn Cheney is as much of a monster as her husband or not.

What I could have done without was the voiceover and narration by Plemons, and all the...stage pieces in the background, like Plemons putting those chess pieces/images of Bush’s team then knocking them off. Or any of the images of the heart beating/dying, what was supposedly going through Cheney’s mind, when we don’t know. The worst was the scene between Lynn and Cheney reciting Shakespeare to each other. It was late and I don’t know if that was MacBeth or something else. Mainly because Cheney was an idiot when it came to school (assuming that he wasn’t the best of students like the movie showed), and it just took me out of the movie.

I did laugh at the fake credits of them living Happily Ever After.

This could have been a better movie if they had let the story tell itself without all that extra stuff, but maybe this is how McKay makes movies. A lot of the information at the end wasn’t new or unknown so I don’t know why they put it there-about the toll Iraq took on human lives. I did miss whether Liz and Mary Cheney repaired their relationship. I do remember her waffling then saying she was against gay marriage.

I definitely didn’t recognize Lisa Gay Hamilton as Condaleeza Rice!

I did roll my eyes at the camera panning at who looked like to be John McCain, though.

But yeah, Christian Bale DESERVES all the accolades he’s gotten for his performance, and if he hasn’t, he FUCKING SHOULD.

And if he does show up at the Oscars, he better be shaven so I can swoon over him, and not wonder why he’s hiding his face behind some fugly beard or goatee, because he’s a beautiful man. Those cheekbones alone are swoonworthy.♥️❤️🥰🥰❤️♥️

[Empress1]

I really like Christian Bale. I think he's one of those actors who is legit in it for the love of the craft, hence why he goes all-in like he does (did he gain all that weight for this? I hope not - he's taken his body down the other way for a role too and that extreme yo-yoing is terrible for the body). You don't see him in the tabloids much, he doesn't do the late-night talk shows much, but damn if he doesn't put his all into his roles. I thought he was great here (I did have the thought that he was using his Batman voice).

On 12/30/2018 at 1:00 AM, GHScorpiosRule said:

I can’t decide if Lynn Cheney is as much of a monster as her husband or not.

I came away thinking Lynn was worse. I know nothing about her IRL but I came away thinking she was really relentless in her quest for power. I fully believe that if Dick hadn't been successful she would have dropped him in a second for someone who would have been. Same with Liz. I'm not sure the sisters' relationship has repaired. It wouldn't if I were Mary.

Jesse Plemons will always be Landry from Friday Night Lights to me, so I'm always glad to see him.

White men stay failing upward, I swear. Dick flunked out of school, two DUIs, bar fights, and he still gets to be a CEO (and beyond). Hmph.

[GHScorpiosRule]

On 12/31/2018 at 9:22 AM, Empress1 said:

I really like Christian Bale. I think he's one of those actors who is legit in it for the love of the craft, hence why he goes all-in like he does (did he gain all that weight for this? I hope not - he's taken his body down the other way for a role too and that extreme yo-yoing is terrible for the body).

He really did. That is not a fat suit he was wearing. I've loved him for years. Though he wasn't a child actor like Culkin or Drew Barrymore, he was only 13 or 14 when Spielberg cast him for Empire of the Sun. The atrocious Batman voice for The Dark Knight, notwithstanding, for me, he's the BEST live action Bats, but no one, NO ONE will top Kevin!Fucking!Conroy! 

But like I said, if Bale is attending the Oscars, he better be all "cleaned" up so I can admire his beautifulness.

Edited January 2, 2019 by GHScorpiosRule

[Empress1]

4 minutes ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

He really did. That is not a fat suit he was wearing. I've loved him for years. Though he wasn't a child actor like Culkin or Drew Barrymore, he was only 13 or 14 when Spielberg cast for Empire of the Sun. The atrocious Batman voice for The Dark Knight, notwithstanding, for me, he's the BEST live action Bats, but no one, NO ONE will top Kevin!Fucking!Conroy! 

But like I said, if Bale is attending the Oscars, he better be all "cleaned" up so I can admire his beautifulness.

Holy shit. I just looked it up; he gained 40 pounds. And he shaved his head! Fuck that, I don't have that kind of dedication. I'd let them fit me for a wig and a fat suit (like Amy Adams did) and keep it moving.

[Sarah 103]

What is the Shakespeare play that the dialogue in the bedroom scene comes from? Thanks to anyone who can help. 

[Silver Raven]

On 12/31/2018 at 12:29 PM, Sarah 103 said:

What is the Shakespeare play that the dialogue in the bedroom scene comes from? Thanks to anyone who can help. 

It reminded me of Macbeth, but I don't think it was, though that would have been appropriate.

Wow, I loved this movie.  Every actor did a great job.  Tyler Perry was superb (and thin!) Amy Adams was a cold-ass woman whom I wouldn't want to cross.  And Bale went fro a nothing schlub to an evil, evil man.

[GHScorpiosRule]

On 12/31/2018 at 3:29 PM, Sarah 103 said:

What is the Shakespeare play that the dialogue in the bedroom scene comes from? Thanks to anyone who can help. 

It turns out it’s not from any Shakespeare play, but dialogue written to sound like Shakespeare. I’ve Googled and tried to find out which play it was from, and all I got were articles where McKay is quoted as loving Shakespeare. But no credit to which play. I even tried searching using one of the lines, and got zip.

[alihart41]

On 12/31/2018 at 3:29 PM, Sarah 103 said:

What is the Shakespeare play that the dialogue in the bedroom scene comes from? Thanks to anyone who can help. 

It's not from any play. McKay wrote it with help from his teen daughter, who's in a Shakespeare for Kids group: https://ew.com/movies/2018/12/24/creating-vice-adam-mckay-christian-bale-dick-cheney-satire/

[annzeepark914]

On 1/1/2019 at 10:41 PM, alihart41 said:

It's not from any play. McKay wrote it with help from his teen daughter, who's in a Shakespeare for Kids group: https://ew.com/movies/2018/12/24/creating-vice-adam-mckay-christian-bale-dick-cheney-satire/

Now, I like that! Faux Shakespeare coming from 2 faux Americans. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Congratulations to Christian Bale for winning a Golden Globe!

BEST ACTOR - COMEDY/MUSICAL

Christian Bale, “Vice”

[Chaos Theory]

On 1/6/2019 at 11:16 PM, ElectricBoogaloo said:

Congratulations to Christian Bale for winning a Golden Globe!

BEST ACTOR - COMEDY/MUSICAL

Christian Bale, “Vice”

And thank you Satan for honoring him.  

[Silver Raven]

48 minutes ago, Chaos Theory said:

And thank you Satan for honoring him.  

Liz Cheney is not amused by his speech.

[annzeepark914]

I'm hoping he wins the Oscar for his role as Cheney.

[snickers]

he seems to be on track-he won 2 critic choice awards for the role!

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Vice won three Critics' Choice Awards tonight!

Best Actor: Christian Bale – Vice as Dick Cheney

Best Actor in a Comedy: Christian Bale – Vice as Dick Cheney

Best Hair and Makeup

[choclatechip45]

I just saw this Christian Bale did a great job as Dick Cheney and Amy Adams did a great job as Lynne Cheney.

[Simon Boccanegra]

I saw this earlier in the week and found it, if never dull for long, a bit hollow. It's the same kind of smirky recent-history primer as McKay's The Big Short, with diminishing returns. There were stunning makeup work and photo-accurate impersonations by actors who had obviously watched a lot of tape (only John Hillner's Bush 41 was subpar, and he isn't in it for long), but it wasn't in the service of much that will stay with me. I couldn't figure out the "why" of it, who this movie was intended to reach. I'm guessing people who already hated Cheney and want to see him skewered at length, but he remains an inscrutable center for a 132-minute movie. McKay isn't a strongly psychological auteur, to put it mildly.    

No complaints about the nominations for the actors and those who helped them achieve their physical transformations, but Best Picture, Director, and Original Screenplay? No.  

Great trailer, though. Just about the best trailer I've ever seen for a middling film.  

[revbfc]

Yeah, we all know Christian Bale knocked it out of the park.  What’s not said enough is how refreshing it was to see a biopic that used a custom template.  Yes, we got the story, but it seemed more like a fever dream than “Here’s our protagonist, and here are his airbrushed accomplishments.”  Was it too on the nose at times?  Yes.  Did it neglect to show us how he went from Wyoming lineman to Washington, DC?  Yes.  Did it rush the events of second Bush term?  Yes.  In spite of those things, I think they did a great job.

Edited April 5, 2019 by revbfc

[Spartan Girl]

Finally watched it tonight, and I'll just echo everyone that Bale nailed everything right down to the walk. And Amy...wow. Another great performance that got overlooked by the Oscars. 

I laughed at the fake happy ending.

And without getting political, aside from poor Kurt and Mary, there was not one sympathetic person in this movie. All a bunch of ambitious power hungry vultures.

[Brn2bwild]

I've been wanting to see this and finally did.  While Christian Bale was great, everything else felt surprisingly lackluster.

Some pretty bad shit happened during those years, but most of it flies by in the blink of an eye.  It would have been better if they had just focused on what Cheney did after 2000, especially after 9-11.

[Rickster]

Saw this last night and would agree with the negative comments here. Great acting by Bale, very good by Adams, some of the others, like Carell, a bit cartoonish.

I liked some of McKay’s quirky tricks in The Big Short, where they jazzed up a potentially dull subject. Here, I found them incredibly distracting and I was cringing during the fake credits and the dinner scene. With Bale’s (and Adam’s) performance there was the potential for a great incisive biopic here, but the weak script and cutesy directoral gimmicks really sunk this one for me. Definitely not worthy of a Best Picture nomination.

[Kel Varnsen]

Finally watched this on Prime video last week. It was good, but my favourite Adam McKay movie is still Talladega Nights. Wish this movie had covered a bit more like the time a guy said "go fuck yourself Mr. Cheney" when he was doing an on-site interview after Hurricane Katrina.

Also I would pay money to have some of those two person Bush/Cheney scenes recut so anytime the camera is on W it is the Will Ferrel version.

[Hanahope]

Well it’s clear from this movie how the current administration got its basis for many of its proclamations.  I had no idea Cheney dated back to Nixon. it really shows how such vileness has permeated certain politics and has effects that lasts decades.