‘Vice’ simply overplays its hand

Posted on January 11, 2019

By MARK VIOLA

“Vice” — which purports to tell the story of Dick Cheney’s decades-long rise from political cog to vice president of the United States — may be one of the most difficult films of 2018 for me to review, while simultaneously being one of the easiest.

The simple answer to the question of whether you will enjoy this movie is to split it along America’s current political divide. If you’re of the liberal persuasion, you’ll probably like this movie. If you’re a conservative, you’ll probably not.

And, that’s really the problem with this movie. It is well made by writer/director Adam McKay (“The Big Short”) and features some exceptional performances, especially from Christian Bale (“The Dark Knight”), who once again transforms his body, this time to portray Cheney. Yet, like most everything dealing with politics today, it is overly loud and overly sure that not only is it right, but that anyone who disagrees is not just wrong — but evil. The prevailing cult of personality needs villains as much as it needs heroes.

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