Trailers for The Founder have been great, but after the movie was out and then gone, and the awards season, too, came and gone without it; my anticipation for it has waned and I didn't expect much from it anymore.
However, one thing you can count on was the performances of all the leads. Michael Keaton was brilliant as Ray Kroc. It was quite the journey to follow his arc from someone that was intelligent, hungry and hardworking; to a ruthless, cold and adversarial individual that would do anything to win.
And equally great was Nick Offerman as Dick McDonald, followed closely by John Caroll Lynch as Mac McDonald; who were just the sweetest and nicest people in their line, not to mention very brilliant in their own right.
Directed by John Lee Hancock who you would have thought would be a bigger name by now, having directed The Blind Side and Saving Mr. Banks. But he is still without a Best Director nomination from the Oscars. And after watching The Founder, you are reminded of that fact because there was still something missing from the way he tells his stories. He still lacks a certain magic that perhaps The Blind Side was the one that came closest to.
But unlike the aforementioned Academy Award-winning movie, the female leads in this one were weak. Even though there were strong performances from Laura Dern and Linda Cardellini, their character development were not prevalent.
Watching the story develop in the first half, I was craving for some McDonald's by the second act. But after the third act, I despised the franchise because of what Kroc did to the McDonalds. And it was just hard to feel any positivity once the credit started rolling. So it's no longer a wonder why there was very little award buzz.
But at the end, it was still an amazing story to see how the Golden Arches came to what it is today. And because it is still such a success story today, the entertainment value for it is still strong.
No comments:
Post a Comment