When Christian Bale won a Golden Globe for his role as Vice President Dick Cheney in the film Vice, the first thing he did was thank his wife for reminding him before he hit the stage that less is more… As he tends to put his foot in his mouth often.

The second thing he did was this: “I’d like to thank Satan for giving me the inspiration to play this role…”

Vice tells the story of Dick Cheney’s political rise to the second highest office in the United States of America.

Story: While some of the details of this story are disturbing, I am going to give Adam McKay credit for writing and directing a fully comprehensive account of Dick Cheney’s career. Beyond that, there is clear bias in the telling of the story. And while it’s easy to recognize the bias, much of it is still based in fact.

But most interestingly, the narrator’s connection to Dick Cheney is the foundation for the story. And when that is revealed, you understand the bias.

Performances: So Christian Bale is outstanding as Dick Cheney. He’s already won a Golden Globe and is nominated for an Oscar. Amy Adams as Lynne Cheney was nominated for a Golden Globe and is now nominated for an Oscar. Both performances well deserved.

Other performances of note: Steve Carell as Donald Rumsfeld and Sam Rockwell as President George W. Bush – Bush 42. I also want to give a special mention to Tyler Perry for his portrayal of Colin Powell. A pleasant surprise…

Visual: This film is about the costumes. Christian Bale is know for his ability to transform into his characters and Dick Cheney is no exception. Weight, speech pattern, manner. Spot on.

It was also nice to see the scenes travel through time.

But some of the scenes were blatantly gratuitous. Like the revelation of the narrator’s connection and a few other scenes that were clearly put in the film to make a liberal point. Conservatives will surely be pointing the finger during these moments…

Rating: The writer and journalist in me hates stories that are told with bias. This is one of those stories There are two sides to every story unless you stick strictly to the truth. I’m skeptical in this case because of the bias even though I can personally vouch for some of the facts. It’s the ones that I can’t vouch for that trouble me…

C+ for Vice. I’m happy to let the individual performances speak for themselves…