{"id":11363,"date":"2025-03-12T17:52:16","date_gmt":"2025-03-12T21:52:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=11363"},"modified":"2025-03-12T17:52:16","modified_gmt":"2025-03-12T21:52:16","slug":"bolden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2025\/03\/12\/bolden\/","title":{"rendered":"Bolden"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Bolden<\/strong> (2019)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Orchard\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 101 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (sexual content, graphic nudity, brutal violence, language, racial epithets, drug use)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Dan Pritzker\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Dan Pritzker and David N. Rothschild\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Wynton Marsalis, Mark Isham and Scott Steiner\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Neal Norton\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 3, 2019 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Gary Carr, Erik LaRay Harvey, Yaya DaCosta, Michael Rooker, Ian McShane, Reno Wilson,\u00a0 Robert Ri\u2019chard, Karimah Westbrook, JoNell Kennedy, Breon Pugh, Ser\u2019Darius Blain, Calvin Johnson, Donald Watkins, Korey Webb-Turner, Justin Faulkner.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: N\/A<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u00a0The opening titles of Bolden<\/strong> inform us that while not much is known about New Orleans-born cornetist Buddy Bolden (1877-1931), he is regarded as the inventor of jazz. It may not sound like much to go on, but I\u2019ve seen movies built on far less than Dan Pritzker\u2019s impressionistic biopic of an immensely talented figure brought down by racism and his own personal demons. Bolden\u2019s story is a true American tragedy.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Despite the efforts of others to erase Bolden\u2019s name from the annals of music history, jazz legend Louis Armstrong publicly credited him for his contribution to music at a concert broadcast over the radio just months before Bolden\u2019s death in a Louisiana mental institution. Bolden<\/strong> opens with this concert. It\u2019s a lively sequence that shows Armstrong (Wilson, Mike & Molly) performing for an all-white audience while a whole bunch of black fans gather outside to listen. The concert triggers something in Bolden (Carr, The Deuce) who can hear the broadcast through the air ducts. It\u2019s late at night and everybody else is asleep. Bolden wanders around in a daze as he takes a journey through his memories. He recalls himself as a young boy lying on the floor under his mother\u2019s sewing machine in the factory where she worked. Even then, he had music in him. Right before his eyes, the women turn into dancers moving in time to the music in his head. It\u2019s a scene worthy of Bob Fosse (All That Jazz). Pritzker utilizes a non-linear narrative in his depiction of Bolden\u2019s life, an intertwining of hazy memories and fever dreams. We\u2019re taken through the rise and fall of his career, his marriage and, ultimately, his descent into drugs and madness.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Bolden<\/strong> plays just like an improvisational jazz piece in how it drifts from one scene to the other in no discernible order. It\u2019s a conceit as frustrating as it is brilliant. Although never dull, the movie leaves the viewer feeling mentally exhausted. A lot of what\u2019s shown is not based on fact. Due to the lack of specific knowledge of his subject\u2019s life, Pritzker takes creative liberties with the details. For example, it\u2019s true there are no known recordings of Bolden. Some of his bandmates claimed that he made at least one phonograph cylinder but it\u2019s never been found. There\u2019s question as to whether it even exists. In the movie, we\u2019re told that the same racist judge (McShane, Hellboy) that had Bolden locked away in the hospital also repressed the recording. This, of course, is pure speculation on the part of the makers.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Carr hits all the right notes as the titular character. It\u2019s not as an easy role to play. The actor has only a broad notion of Bolden as a man and musician. A lot of it is guesswork. Thankfully, he nails it. He hits every high note and low note with equal precision. He shows us Bolden at his best, performing for energetic nightclub crowds dancing and jiving to his music, a then-innovative fusion of ragtime, blues and gospel. He also shows us Bolden at his worst when he begins to realize his career is over courtesy of the powerful white men behind the scenes.\u00a0 It\u2019s a pitch perfect performance.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The music, written, arranged and performed by Wynton Marsalis, is terrific. I\u2019m not an expert on jazz but I like what I heard in Bolden<\/strong>. The cinematography by Neal Norton helps the viewer keep track of what timeline they\u2019re in. His early life is shown in sepia tones while his happier memories are rendered in bright colors. The scenes inside the institution are dark and dreary. The period clothing and sets give Bolden<\/strong> a strong note of authenticity.<\/p>\n

\u00a0My only gripe is that a few shots, like the one of multiple women holding babies when Bolden learns his wife is pregnant, go unexplained. Does this mean he\u2019s already had several children with other women? The movie never tells us this. Then again, it\u2019s not known if he did or didn\u2019t. So much of Bolden\u2019s life is unaccounted for. He never wrote down his music; he always played by ear. I can\u2019t even say for sure if Marsalis based his score on Bolden\u2019s actual music. Bolden is an enigma, one that may never be solved. What we do know is that is his story is sad. He had his demons. He lived in a time when blacks weren\u2019t even second-class citizens. Life didn\u2019t treat him kindly. Given his valuable contribution to the world of music, he should be recognized. Thankfully, Bolden<\/strong> rights a long-unchecked wrong. It\u2019s not perfect but at least it\u2019s something.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bolden (2019)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Orchard\/Drama\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 101 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (sexual content, graphic nudity, brutal violence, language, racial epithets, drug use)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Dan Pritzker\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Dan Pritzker and David N. Rothschild\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Wynton Marsalis, Mark Isham and Scott Steiner\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Neal Norton\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 3, 2019 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Gary Carr, Erik LaRay Harvey, Yaya DaCosta, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11419,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dramas","category-hidden-treasures"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Bolden-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11363"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11363\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11421,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11363\/revisions\/11421"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}