Cadillac Records

An all-star cast and some great soul music juice up this fact-based tale of the friendship between legendary bluesman Muddy Waters (Jeffrey Wright) and record producer Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody). Beyonce turns in an Oscar-caliber performance as Etta James.

Review in a Hurry: An all-star cast and some great soul music juice up this fact-based tale of the friendship between legendary bluesman Muddy Waters (Jeffrey Wright) and record producer Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody).

The Bigger Picture: Call it Dreamdudes. Chess Records was at ground zero for the birth of rock 'n' roll, and this is its story, beginning when sharecropper Waters heads to the big city and starts busking, and encounters ambitious new promoter Chess.

With some well-placed payola, their "race records" become a hit, and newer, bigger talents come into the fold, including Howlin' Wolf (Eamonn Walker), Chuck Berry (Mos Def) and Etta James (Beyoncé). As with every music-business story, however, there are the inevitable pitfalls of drugs, groupies and poorly invested cash—fans of gangsta rap may be surprised at how similar the lives of the musicians who paved the way for today's artists were.

It's no surprise that Beyoncé can belt 'em out like Etta, but Wright, Def, Walker and Columbus Short as Little Walter turn out to be quite capable of carrying the tunes, too. Purists might prefer simply to listen to the original recordings, but for those less knowledgeable this is a great introduction.

And it isn't hard to imagine that Beyoncé, who also produced, might have taken the role because she was jealous of Jennifer Hudson's Oscar—here she gets to do everything her Dreamgirls costar did and more, from the spurned lover bit to the scenes of addiction and, of course, finally the emotional farewell song.

The only slightly weak link is Cedric the Entertainer as songwriter Willie Dixon—while the others are playing characters, he's simply doing what he always does, and his narration is unnecessary, except perhaps to make clear that we're being told the story by an unreliable narrator...

The 180—a Second Opinion: ...which might explain some of the fact-fudging at work here. And not just the standard manipulation for dramatic effect. This movie drastically changes the deaths of two major characters from the way they actually happened. Sticklers for veracity have reason to complain.