Watching 'Bulworth' feels like having somebody punch you in the face and as you turn around to recover and regain your balance, there's somebody waiting that throws a bucket of cold water where you've just been punched. In other words, the film is a double whammy of intended satire but comes off more as a series of condescending failed scenes which do nothing to advance the nature of the movie's characters and caricatures. Caricatures are usually the least interesting thing about a film that centres on people because they never get developed beyond the realm of their first scene(s), hence, their given name. 'Bulworth' has more than its share of unnecessary players and the centre piece of the movie's main personality is a man with a pretty unattractive personality named Jay Billington Bulworth (Warren Beatty).

I understood completely where Beatty was trying to go with this film but rather than churn out a political satire, Beatty has instead made a film where Bulworth rambles about our unbalanced society without telling us anything about how he intends to improve it. That is often the true nature of politicians and if the movie wants to do that, what exactly is its point beyond anything we've seen before? It doesn't take a genius to do a simple turning of the tables and make a fibbing politician, who doesn't believe in the things he's saying and turn him into a suicidal and supposedly conscience stricken self redeemer who becomes suicidal and says what's really on his mind.

The film opens with a rehearsed speech Billington intends to give where the opening line is heard over and over and over again and is the usual *blah*blah*blah* he will use in an upcoming campaign. We soon begin to see Bulworth's mental breakdown as he displays his suicidal tendencies and takes out a large insurance policy on himself before hiring a contract killer to knock himself off?! I didn't believe it for a second. The idea is too simple to be believable and even if you accept the premise, the movie's core issue hasn't even surfaced yet.

As Bulworth is speaking to a large audience of African-Americans in South Central L.A., he makes some rather blunt comments that he believes are true, putting aside the political line for an unexpected dose of what many will accept as reality. Next his comments turn to the Jewish community and these two outbursts cause a media carnage where Bulworth is asked to explain exactly what he meant by these two incidents. Somewhere in the middle of all this, he begins saying what he really feels is the trouble with American society. His remarks make the U.S.A. sound instead like the Corporate States of America, perhaps a good theory and while reasonably admirable and truthful, his execution of these ideas are awkward and sound more like the ramblings of a paranoid fanatic.

During his outburst in South Central L.A., he meets Nina (Halle Berry), a young woman from the community whom he fancies and he tries to understand her world and express himself through it by a transformation of image. It's a world Bulworth doesn't understand because the words he hears and the problems he sees, he repeats them when interviewed on television and the execution this time isn't only awkward, its phony and self indulgent on Beatty's part.

What's even more astonishing about this film is the way that Beatty presents not only the other characters in the film, but his own. The other characters played by such wonderful actors as Jack Warden, Paul Sorvino, Oliver Platt, Don Cheadle and Christine Baranski are never given any real focus or development and when the fate of Beatty's character is decided, you will NOT care.

Beatty is more concerned with presenting his story too quickly and as you figure out that his film lacks depth and insight, you'll be amazed at what little foundation is built around the the rest of the story.

Beatty directs and is the co-author of 'Bulworth' and for a man who has been a part of classics like 'Bonnie and Clyde', 'Shampoo', ' Heaven Can Wait' and his most ambitious film for which he won a Best Director Oscar, 1981's 'Reds', Beatty has made an abysmal failure of a film the has absolutely no after thought and is as stimulating as frozen silly putty.