"Bessie" is a biopic about the famous blues singer, Bessie Smith. And, after watching the film, I wonder why they made it in the first place. This is because although she was an amazing woman, Ms. Smith was also a complete and total mess....and very difficult to like. The drinking, the self-destructive lifestyle and more all serve to make this a movie about a woman difficult to admire.
The story is about the life of Bessis Smith, though it only gives tiny snippets of her early life and the ending is completely abrupt....giving a very false view of what came next for the singer. It appears as if there's some turnaround...some happy ending. But this isn't what happened at all.
So, the difficulty in caring about Smith combined with no real ending to the story conspire to make this watchable but far from as good as it could have been. Sad, as the performances by Queen Latifah and others were pretty amazing.
The story is about the life of Bessis Smith, though it only gives tiny snippets of her early life and the ending is completely abrupt....giving a very false view of what came next for the singer. It appears as if there's some turnaround...some happy ending. But this isn't what happened at all.
So, the difficulty in caring about Smith combined with no real ending to the story conspire to make this watchable but far from as good as it could have been. Sad, as the performances by Queen Latifah and others were pretty amazing.