Review: Waltzing With Brando

Official synopsis: Movie star Marlon Brando (Billy Zane) recruits a Los Angeles architect, Bernard Judge (Jon Heder) to build the world's first ecologically perfect retreat on a small, uninhabited island in Tahiti.

Waltzing With Brando showed up on the Oscar shortlist for Best Makeup late last year, only for the film not to meet the eligibility requirements to qualify. Then it felt like it disappeared. (Kind of like Brando seemingly wanted to do in Tahiti) I had mostly forgotten about it until the screener landed in my inbox. Now with release date later this week, we're ready to see Zane's passion project.

First and foremost, Zane makes an excellent Brando. He nails his mannerisms and almost sounds exactly like him. The film has Zane recreate some of Brando's iconic scenes, and while not really necessary for the story being told, it was fun to see. I'd love for Zane and the makeup team involved here to really tackle a hard hitting biopic about him. He lived quite the life, and there's so much story there.

This story however is simply about his time creating what will eventually become The Brando Resort and is mostly told through the eyes of Heder's Bernard. He's James McAvoy's Nicolas to Forest Whitaker's Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland or Eddie Redmayne's Colin to Michelle Williams' Marilyn Monroe in My Week With Marilyn. This framing makes sense, but Heder doesn't have the chops of McAvoy or Redmayne to pull it off. His dialogue feels unnatural, he doesn't have chemistry with Zane or anyone else for that matter. Sometimes Heder addresses the camera, sometimes it's just his narration. Breaking the 4th wall was a distracting choice.

I spent most of this film wishing I was just seeing more of Zane playing Brando in something else, and I felt bad because I don't dislike Jon Heder as an actor. He's clearly capable of being more than just the role that gave him his breakout, but it's just not this film. 

Maybe we'll get a great Brando film some day. I still think this is worth seeing if you're a big Brando film, but it just left a bit to be desired for me personally.

Waltzing With Brando opens in theaters September 19th.

Grade: C+