The story of how the blues became popular and gave birth to rock and roll begins at a dingy bar on the rough South Side of Chicago in 1947, where the owner Leonard Chess (Adrien Brody), hires a talented but undisciplined blues combo that includes quiet and thoughtful guitar prodigy Muddy Waters (Jeffrey Wright) and impulsive and colorful harmonica player Little Walter (Columbus Short). Chess treats his musicians like family – he buys them a Cadillac when they record their first hit record. But it's not until 1955 when a Chess artist finally "crosses over" into the realm of mainstream ("white") America – a skinny guy from St. Louis named Chuck Berry (Mos Def), whose dynamic "duck walk" and catchy, country-tinged tunes mark the birth of rock-and-roll. When Berry is arrested and jailed at the height of his career, Chess finds another talented performer to cross over – singer Etta James (Beyoncé Knowles), an emotionally scarred young woman whose vulnerability tempts Chess' loyalty and concern in unexpected ways. As rock-and-roll grows more popular, the Chess artists find themselves revered by a new generation of musicians, but they have also each earned and lost a small fortune on booze, women and the high life, and their addictions begin to take their toll. Even as tragedy befalls, their music and their spirit remain strong: as the sixties wind down and Leonard Chess gets out of the record business, the blues live on.As you can tell from the absurdly long synopsis - this movie was way too overdone. It started off really good and I was really enjoying it for the first half. It then started twisting and turning all over the place and I very quickly lost interest in the characters and what was happening to them. I kind of just wanted the movie to end already. I thought that all the performances were good but the script was too big and they definitely could have cut the movie down a lot.
I wouldn't really recommend that anyone rush to see this. Its not a horrible watch, but you can just wait for cable.
