Bobby

June 6th 1968 - Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy has a date with destiny.

Rather than being a direct Kennedy biopic, ‘Bobby’ follows the lives of a number of guests and employees of the Ambassador Hotel in the hours leading up to Kennedy’s assassination. Written and directed by Emilio Estevez, ‘Bobby’ successfully captures the zeitgeist; the film is peppered with contemporary footage, music and photos giving the viewer an impression of what 1968 America was like. America’s hopes and fears for the future are shown on screen and vocalised by the cast.

However, having assembled a great cast, the film doesn’t do much with them other than help capture the spirit of the time. “22 lives linked by a moment the world will never forget” (as the poster claims) means that not much screen time can be given to each of them; I would have preferred for it to have concentrated more on some stories and while others were dropped. Ultimately ‘Bobby’ is a very average film; it’s not bad, but it doesn’t excel either.

2007 seems to slowly be turning into the “Year of the Ensemble Cast” with ‘Bobby’ joining ‘A Prairie Home Companion’ and ‘Babel’; that’s three in one month.