.: Roberts' Reviews - Movie Reviews :.

definitely becoming the year of the stellar casts. It all started in the summer with Robert Altman's A Prairie Home Companion that could have filled the films promotional poster just by using every stars name in a 22 font. Then came The Departed which starred a bunch of XY chromosomes that would have demanded in upwards of $15 million each if they were starring in a film vehicle of their own.

In the upcoming weeks there is the ensemble cast in The Good Shepherd and lest not forget (although in-all it was forgettable) All The King's Men which comes out on DVD before Christmas that contained more stars than the New York Yankees batting cage.

This week's attempt to wow audiences with a parade of I-know-him-from's is Bobby which tells the story of multiple characters all with the backdrop of the Bobby Kennedy assassination at the Ambassador Hotel on June 6, 1968.

Within the 112 minute running time of Bobby you will see such familiar faces as Harry Belefante, Anthony Hopkins, Martin Sheen, Sharon Stone, Emilio Estevez, Demi Moore, Joshua Jackson, Laurence Fishburne, Freddy Rodriguez, Helen Hunt, William H. Macy, Christian Slater, Heather Graham, Ashton Kutcher, Lindsay Lohan and Elijah Wood. It was like a People's magazine exploded onto the screen in live action glory.

To go through each story in description would result in a review consisting of more pages than Emilio Estevez's script, so I am going to use my get-out-of-jail free card that I have been holding on to for the better part of the year and spare my fingers the banging on the keyboard.

Sub-stories chronicle tales of infidelity, drug abuse, alcoholism, political pandering and race relations all in the few hours before Bobby Kennedy was to make his final appearance on his campaign trail in the decade that saw the all-too-soon demise of his brother John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King.

Each story gives us a glimpse into an era that helped shape American maybe more than any other and writer/director/star Estevez tries hard - maybe too hard - to make sure that everything from LSD hallucinations to Vietnam to Andy Warhol references are thrown in our faces to remind us of a time of violence, a time of change and a time of global mourning.

When you have a cast of egos it's hard to give each one enough screen time to allow them to shine, but Estevez does his best to give everyone just enough to have something to work with. Most notably his ex, Demi Moore who as the alcoholic performer Virginia Fallon, gives one of those short but good enough to possibly be nominated performances especially in scenes where Fallon and hairdresser Miriam (played by equally wonderful and almost unrecognizable Sharon Stone).

But where Estevez gets passing grades for keeping multiple stories floating like juggled bowling pins in the air at the same time, it is also his downfall. With every new character being introduced, you almost take a step back to focus, recognize and place the actor - especially since Hunt, Stone and Kutcher all look like they did their own make-up and wardrobe.

For those who are looking to see a movie about the late Bobby Kennedy, this is not it. In fact, the film would be better represented by the title Ambassador than Bobby as only in the final chapters does Bobby actually become a participant in the films outcome. Instead the movie uses the impending arrival of Bobby and his eventual death as only a backdrop just like Titanic used the sinking of a ship for its means to an end.

Luckily the movie stands on its own despite its borderline false advertising (include the films tagline "He saw wrong and tried to right it. He saw suffering and tried to heal it. He saw war and tried to stop it" as another way to mislead us into thinking we would be viewing something more autobiographical). The stories are tight and generally interesting and somehow Estevez is able to pack a small emotional punch when the eventual shots are fired from the hotel's kitchen. Just don't expect to know anything more about the man or the legend by the time the experience is over.