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BOBBY (2006) (***)

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Emilio Estevez wrote and directed this drama following the lives of 22 people in the Ambassador Hotel the day Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated. Though his name supplies the title to this Altman-esque feature, Bobby Kennedy is not a character. The real politician is however seen in archival footage woven throughout the narrative. The various stories are meant to peek into the various cultural currents that were running through America at the time from the hippie movement to the war in Vietnam. The stronger stories keep the film from lagging under its own ambitions, making it a compelling look into the ways RFK's death altered the course of America and the lives of its people.

One of the film's best stories is kitchen worker Jose, who has tickets to go see Dodgers pitcher Don Drysdale beat the consecutive shut out record. However, racist kitchen manager Timmons (Christian Slater, ROBIN HOOD) has assigned him a double shift without telling him. So Jose gives his tickets to the dignified cook Edward Robinson (Laurence Fishburne, WHAT'S LOVE GOT TO DO WITH IT?), much to the dismay of angry fellow kitchen worker Miguel (Jacob Vargas, 2004's FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX), who wants to make money on it. Diane (Lindsay Lohan, MEAN GIRLS) plans to marry fellow high school student William (Elijah Wood, LORD OF THE RINGS) in an effort to keep him out of Vietnam. Kennedy campaign workers Cooper (Shia LaBeouf, TRANSFORMERS) and Jimmy (Brian Geraghty, JARHEAD) play hooky from their duties to find drug dealer Fisher (Ashton Kutcher, TV's THAT 70S SHOW), who gives them acid so they can get closer to God. And waitress/wanna-be actress Susan Taylor (Mary Elizabeth Winstead, GRINDHOUSE) knows they're high. Wade (Joshua Jackson, TV's DAWSON'S CREEK) is running RFK's campaign and sets up a meeting with Bobby and dedicated black campaign worker Dwayne (Nick Cannon, DRUMLINE), who is just shy of militant.

The weaker stories involve hotel manager Paul (William H. Macy, THE COOLER), who is married to the hotel's beautician Miriam (Sharon Stone, TOTAL RECALL), but is having an affair with the younger switchboard operator Angela (Heather Graham, BOOGIE NIGHTS), who confides her problems in fellow operator Patricia (Joy Bryant, SKELETON KEY). Tim Fallon (Estevez, FLATLINERS) is the exasperated husband of drunken lounge singer Virginia (Demi Moore, ST. ELMO'S FIRE). He's not happy when his wife's manager Phil (David Krumholtz, SLUMS OF BEVERLY HILLS) books them into a month-long gig in Vegas in the middle of the summer. John Casey (Anthony Hopkins, PROOF) is the retired doorman, who still comes to the hotel everyday to play chess with permanent fixture Nelson (Harry Belafonte, CARMEN JONES). Lenka Janacek (Svetlana Metkina, MINI'S FIRST TIME) is a poor Yugoslavian reporter desperate to get an interview with Bobby. Jack (Martin Sheen, TV's WEST WING) is a businessman who has paid his way into the evening's party. His wife Samantha (Helen Hunt, AS GOOD AS IT GETS) obsesses about what to wear and how she will impress the important people.

The film works best when it uses the characters actions and personalities to mirror the hot topics of the era as well as the hot topics of today. Themes cover race relations, drugs, war, women's rights, poverty and even global warming. One clip of Kennedy shows him talking with elementary school students about cleaning up the air. Miguel represent the angry boiling in minority communities while Edward represent the calm leader willing to work within the system to bring upon change. Resounding today, Cooper and Jimmy story shows them embracing the freedoms of the day, but regretting what harm they may have caused by not playing their part in what they feel is right. Even the weaker stories find poignancy in single scenes like a great conversation between Virginia and Miriam about the place of women in the world.

The film only drags when it deals with the personal dramas of some of the characters. The Fallons relationship has been done many times before and often better. Paul's peccadilloes aren't really interesting at all. Yet, in the end, for the most part, the stories come together in interesting and thoughtful ways. Though some conclusions are forced or abrupt, the emotions Estevez is trying to convey still work.

BOBBY does have something to say about how the world was and how it has turned out since that fateful day. The use of real footage of Kennedy powerfully brings home that point. Sometimes it's so powerful, you wish Estevez would have just made a straight documentary and forgot about the standard fictional personal dramas and focused of the missing title character. But that's not the film he made. As it is, the film stands as a time capsule of the era it portrays and sadly reminds us how little we have come in many respects since then.

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Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks