DVD Roundup
Now Playing: Ray (2004, d. Taylor Hackford)
As the Academy Awards draw near, one can notice a certain cloying stench in the air...ahh, yes, there it is again. It's coming from that Oscar staple, the biopic, which invariably reduces the complexities of a life to cheap theatrics and obvious messages, capping off the wretched concoction with a rote feel-good ending. It's a recipe that Academy voters can't seem to get enough of, and so we have Jamie Foxx's portrayal of soul legend Ray Charles as the presumptive favorite for Best Actor honors this year. The buzz around Foxx's performance was so positive that I thought perhaps it would be enough to elevate (the aptly named) Taylor Hackford's film above the level of tear-jerking pablum. Wrong! Foxx's impersonation of Charles is dead on, and his musical performances unquestionably great, but the award is not called "Best Mimic" or "Best Singing and Piano Playing." Foxx proved he can act in Collateral--if there was any justice (and when it comes to Oscars, there isn't) he'd have been nominated in the Best Actor category for that role. In this film, he just isn't given anything to work with outside of a legendary stable of songs to perform.

The screenplay, credited to James L. White (from a story by White and Hackford) lays on the biopic conventions: a childhood tragedy that haunts the protagonist; a tough mother (shown in incessant flashbacks) that helps the protagonist overcome his handicap, the protagonist's struggles against adversity (racism, philandering, heroin addiction--take your pick), and a joyful ending in which our hero conquers his demons and the world. The problem is that there's no connective tissue. We know Ray's a genius not because of anything we see on screen, but because we're told so repeatedly by the characters. We know Ray must conquer his heroin habit because drugs are bad (mmmmkay?), but there's no evidence that his shooting up and fooling around had any negative effects on his personal or professional life. Sure, it annoys his faithful wife, gospel singer Della "Bea" Robinson, but that's not enough to get him to change his ways (a scene examining how she came to terms with her husband's wild road life would have been nice). Nor are the earnest entreaties of Atlantic Records chief Ahmet Ertegun (Curtis Armstrong, playing perhaps the first sympathetic record company honcho in movie history), whose vision catapulted Charles to stardom. Nope, Ray just quits heroin (we're never told if he stopped sleeping around) because that's what people do in biopics. And because he has a nice vision where he makes up with his mom and dead baby brother.

Worst of all, the movie shortchanges Charles' undeniable creative genius. Songs spring fully formed into his head, without even a cursory nod to the creative process. Maybe Ray really did write "What I Say" extemporaneously to fill time when a club owner demanded he play 20 more minutes, but would his full band just be able to pick it up on the spur of the moment, complete with finished horn parts and backup vocals? Seeing the group struggle to keep up would have added some interesting tension, but apparently Ray's genius was so great that it extended to anyone who got onstage with him (I know for a fact this isn't true-more on that in a moment). We're shown again and again how Ray's personal life informed his art. Hey, it can't but be the case for all artists, so why does it feel so fake in this movie? The most odious example is a scene in which Ray has just broken off a long affair with backup singer Margie Hendricks (Regina King). He cruelly tells her it's now strictly business from now on, then breaks into his new tune, which just happens to be "Hit the Road, Jack." Of course, Hendricks tearfully breaks into the response part and nails it, having only just picked up the sheet music that Ray, despite his blindness, has somehow been able to write. It was all I could do to keep my eyes from rolling clean out of my head.

From all evidence, Charles was a bit of a bastard. He cheated on his wife, shot horse, mistreated his musicians, and screwed the record company that gave him his first break by leaving to write bland, string-laden crap for big bucks at ABC. To his credit, Hackford doesn't soft peddle this behavior. But instead of drawing a portrait of a complex and conflicted genius, he uses Charles' character flaws as mere signifiers for what he sees as the greater psychological conflict which must be overcome for him to succeed (never mind that Charles wrote his best music during the tumultuous early years). It's complete horseshit. Interestingly, Hackford includes a scene in which Charles stops a performance to berate a musician who's not up to snuff. In the movie, this is to show that despite his addiction, Ray never went onstage high and wouldn't tolerate it from his musicians. When I saw Charles perform several years ago (long after he was supposed to have conquered his addictions), he did the exact same thing, bringing a song to a crashing halt to lay into the drummer, who was filling in that night for the regular drummer, who was ill. It was completely embarrassing. My question is: if the real Ray was a jerk, horse habit or no, wouldn't that make a more interesting film? Well, that doesn't fit into the formula that dictates our protagonists must conquer all their demons by the end of the film. Bring on the gold statuettes!

I couldn't bring myself to delve into the full slate of extras on the double-disc DVD, which include director's commentary, two featurettes, and two uncut musical performances. I will warn potential purchasers about the "extended version" touted on the box. This is not a director's cut; rather, 25 minutes of deleted scenes are branched into the theatrical cut without any editing. It's a jarring experience-when you come to the point where a deleted scene is inserted, the player pauses and then jumps to the scene, and then jumps back and resumes, often right in the middle of a scene. Fortunately, this feature can be turned on or off, but come on-don't bill this as the "extended version."