Nina

Everything you wouldn't want to see in a film about Nina Simone. While Zoe Saldana might get a C+ for effort, one wonders if there were any mirrors anywhere on set or if she figured CGI would fix her appearance; although, the problems with this abysmal film are greater than Zoe's horrific makeup. The story is disjointed and focuses on absolutely arbitrary parts of Nina's life. There is no depth or realness to Cynthia Mort's vision of Nina and - considering the subject matter - that's an injustice. It could be considered an accomplishment that Mort was able to create a film about Nina Simone that leaves the viewer feeling nothing at all. Perhaps the worst part of the film is how ugly they made Nina. While she might not have been what's considered conventionally pretty, Nina possessed an elegant beauty that was a powerful part of her performance. Nina Simone was a beautiful woman and to turn her into a creature from the blackface lagoon in a biopic is unforgivable.

Nina

Yet another film of a famous person that in reality is just an excuse to show off mental illness. In this case the bipolar condition of Nina Simone.

The film assumes that the viewer already is familiar with her life. I wasn't. I only knew her by having heard a couple of her songs. The start of the film rushes ahead through her life to the very end of her life. But it doesn't start at the end and show flash backs. Well... sort of. It was mostly just a confusing mess and I had no clue what her career was like up to the end (where the film begins). The first concert she does is in a small bar. So as a viewer I'm like, OK, so this is the kind of concerts she had. And then I'm told she is one of the most famous singers. OK, so why is she in a small bar performing if she is so famous? And then somebody says that she should be in a huge concert hall, and not in a small bar. And I'm like, yes, so why isn't she? Please tell me, the viewer. No information.

The film revolves around her (non-romantic) relationship with her nurse/assistant/manager. This is uninteresting. It never goes anywhere and there's very little tension. I suspect it's just badly acted. David Oyelowo plays the assistant. I had never heard of him. So I looked him up. He has a long career of so-so stuff. So he doesn't seem particularly talented. He seems to be established as a middling talent. So it's an odd casting. It seems to me like he just didn't have what it took to make this role work.

Zoe Saldana plays Nina Simone. This is also not particularly interesting. But I don't think it's the acting that's the problem this time. I suspect the problem here is the script. A string of scenes showing a crazy person doing crazy things is not interesting. This is not a comedy. The craziness has to be coupled with her being sensible sometimes. There has to be some sort of balance. Nina Simone in this film goes from being disturbingly weird to being bouncing-off-the-walls-in-a-padded-cell- crazy. She's impossible to like. But she's famous for being a musical genius. She created amazing music and trail-blazed against all odds and conquered the world. This is not shown in this film. Nina Simone in this film is just nuts with no redeeming qualities. It's the stuff that made her famous that I'm interested in. This film provides none of it.

They use the "Angry Black Woman" trope to it's fullest extent. Sure, Nina Simone does have ample reason to be angry. But this character seems utterly consumed by it. It's like she has nothing else going for her in her life.

It would be nice with a film about a historical black person that doesn't focus on how much a victim he or she is. I'm not saying that black people historically haven't suffered. What I'm saying is that, by looking at the movies produced focusing on black people, black history seems to be defined by being a victim and nothing else. I'm starting to find this tedious. And in this film it's especially obvious, since her talents are so down-played. It's all about Nina, the crazy victim.

I learned almost nothing about Nina Simone's music career.

The high ratings must be from people unfamiliar with Nina Simone. The makeup looks like Saldana has bad skin. Saldana's acting is passable. But the film is just boring. Saldana's singing lacks the depth of Simone.

Wow, that was a tough watch. Saldana is an appealing and decent actress within her range, but she's way, way out of it here, and given a script and a character that she simply can't do justice to.

It's rare that actors are asked to play older than their age, and for good reason: everyone can remember what it was like being younger, but can only imagine being older. There's no gravitas or presence to Saldana's performance here, and she can't anchor this muddled, tentative film. Since it's entirely about her, well, you see the problem.

And we have to talk about the blackface. Saying "yeah, but it was required for the role" doesn't make it all right. That's how you get Occidentals playing Charlie Chan or Fu Manchu, or girls with less Native American ancestry than Elizabeth Warren playing Comanches.

One rule for all, no exceptions, please.

So, I'll try to not include the controversy I heard about Star Trek's Zoe Saldana, playing the Infamous Nina Simone, although that's what made me interested in buying the ticket.

Overall, Saldana's performance was just OK. It's not the worse thing I've ever seen, it's not the best performance I've ever seen. It's not a milestone in her acting career, unlike her co-star David Oyelowo's magnificent turn as Doctor Martian Luther King Jr. in the movie, Selma. Mike Epps made an interesting cameo as Richard Pryor in the movie which left me something more than Saldana as Simone.

Nina is a focus on the last eight or so years of Simone's life, which was odd as Saldana (and the make up job they did on her) did not convince me she was a 70 year old woman. Mainly, it centers around the relationship Nina had with her new manager, Clifton Henderson.

It's another one of these films that tells us more about the type of personality the artist is rather than anything about the person's life. It's similar to Don Cheadle's take on Miles Davis in the film Miles Ahead, but that film had some magic in it that this movie does not.

Saldana and the film did an OK job letting us know the type of artist Nina Simone was, but you did not feel the passion behind it. I know it's near impossible to create a motion picture about Nina that would visually do what Simone could do with her musical talents, but I did not feel any effort towards it at all.

So overall, at the moment Saldana still has playing the most ionic woman in Sci-Fi on the top of her resume, while playing the greatest singer of all time will not even register. The make-up was fine and her voice was satisfying, but like I said I was not expected her to sound like Nina Simone, but this movie is not passionate like her music.