Share
Talk to Me
Nathan Lee
Tuesday, July 3rd 2007
Having ascended to genre supremacy, the biopic has long since reached its imaginative low—so much so that the banality of Talk To Me is only half disappointing; at least it babbles clichés with conviction. Directed by Kasi Lemmons (Eve's Bayou) from a screenplay by Michael Genet and Rick Famuyiwa, this earnest, ineffectual history lesson stars Don Cheadle as Ralph Waldo "Petey" Green, an ex-con turned Washington, D.C., radio phenomenon who electrified Chocolate City in the 1960s with his streetwise populism. Chiwetel Ejiofor co-stars as Dewey Hughes, a sympathetic producer at the complacent soul station WOL-AM; Martin Sheen appears as The Man. Textured by ego trips, boozing, red velvet tuxedos, and a soundtrack jammed with rousing, if predictable hits of the era, Talk To Melacks every kind of specificity (historical, psychological, socio-cultural) but redeems itself through the dedication of its Cheadlicious lead. As in the overrated Hotel Rwanda, Cheadle is a live wire in dead air, shimmering with vitality—and silk paisley blouses—against his oppressively formulaic context.
Recent Articles
More by Nathan Lee
(Kenneth) Anger Management, at Anthology
Screening the latest as the film and art worlds compete for his star
The New York Asian Film Festival Is the Best Ticket in Town
Still crazy after all these years
New Directors/New Films Brings the New Class
Old New York, the ghosts of Raleigh, and queer debuts mark an exceptional ND/NF
The Cool School
Doc tracks down forgotten pioneers
Asia Argento Rising
No flesh in the pan, Argento erupts as a dazzling director as well as actor
Site Search «
Most Popular
-
The Strangest Landlord-Tenant Relationship In Town? Stacked up in cubicles for decades, immigrants living in a Bowery tenement may have a very unusual situation.
-
Spike Jonze Can't Quite Get Spirit of Where The Wild Things Are On Screen Max and the gang's all here. Let the mild rumpus start!
- A Bloomberg Score Card: The Mayor's Hits and Misses
- We've Bailed out the Banks. When Do We Go After the Crooks Behind our Financial Collapse?
- On Michael Jackson's Mercifully Goofy, Cheerful This Is It
| buy, sell, trade 10,245 | musician 3,613 |
| rentals 12,896 | jobs 1,972 |
| adult entertainment 34,887 | |
| classifieds | backpage.com | Post ads for free! | |
|---|---|