Review of Bobby: Director Emilio Estevez and Ensemble Cast Salutes the Life of Robert Kennedy

Early in Bobby, the new film by Emilio Estevez, the characters quote dialogue from the classic 1932 movie Grand Hotel signaling that this is going to be as much a tribute to the long life of Los Angeles' venerable Ambassador Hotel as it is to the short life of Robert F. Kennedy.

Writer-director-actor Estevez was granted special permission to film his homage on site as the Ambassador was slated for demolition. He was able to reenact RFK's assassination in the notorious kitchen pantry where the unthinkable actually happened. One of the many messages Estevez sends in this nuanced movie is for filmmakers to work domestically (and preferably in California), rather than recreate Los Angeles in Toronto or simulate New York in Prague. The Ambassador is one historic location that can't be outsourced.

Seemingly everyone in Estevez' Blackberry plays a role in this ensemble cast. Neither bio pic nor documentary, Bobby is a freeway cloverleaf of divergent lives that intersect for one June night in 1968 to share a common fateful experience. All of the characters fret and obsess over their individual chores of growing older with wisdom or dignity. Estevez wants us to remember that aging is one of life's travails that Robert Kennedy was never allowed to confront.

The performance of Freddy Rodriguez stands out as the busboy randomly thrust into history's path. William H. Macy is as solid as ever as the hotel's holier-than-thou general manager. Harry Belafonte's appearance is merely the director's salute to old liberal lions. Demi Moore relishes her role as a flamed-out lounge singer representing everyone who sold out during the 1960s and she slurs into the most incomprehensible version of "Louie Louie" ever. Anthony Hopkins (who is also Executive Producer of the film) looks like he has run out of acting juice, especially in his reaction scene to the frantic news of Kennedy's shooting. Ashton Kutcher delivers some levity as the resident hippie with dirty fingernails and food trapped between his teeth who introduces impressionable campaign volunteers Shia LaBeouf and Joshua Jackson to the wonders of LSD. Sharon Stone shines as the wise hotel beautician with such heavy retro eye make-up, it is amazing she can lift her eyelids. Laurence Fishburne's performance bursts the seams and is for a movie much bigger than this, but he is majestic as the hotel cook who ladles out spiritual nourishment with each spoonful of his manna-like berry cobbler.

The soundtrack for the film borrows heavily from popular songs of the era, but they do not overwhelm or manipulate the imagery in the manner of, for example, Forrest Gump. The songs are utilized more in the manner of aural wallpaper. Speaking of wallpaper, the decorative look and feel of the late 1960s is captured authentically in the outstanding production design of Patti Podesta, down to details like the appropriately hideous vintage lamps.

The screenplay by Estevez sputters like a car that needs pushing every now and then, but it rolls toward its destination. He includes some taunting touches, such as TV feed of Walter Cronkite and Mike Wallace explaining how the brand new computerized voting machines installed in Los Angeles precincts will actually slow down the vote count rather than speed it up, and a campaign volunteer warning voters of the phenomenon of hanging chads. Utterly inspirational archival newsreels and interviews of Robert Kennedy speaking about poverty, the environment and other topical issues are dropped into the story at welcomed intervals. It is ironic that the only dead member of the entire ensemble sparks life into the pace of the movie whenever he appears.

Estevez saves the best of Kennedy for the last. The measured, intelligent voice of RFK delivering a speech on the nature of violence is played over images of the shooting aftermath. Make the effort to absorb Kennedy's words separately from the literalness of the mayhem on screen and you will hear one of the most eloquent, brilliant and powerful oratories on the uselessness of violence ever expressed.