By Emilio Frenk.
Director: John Lee Hancock
Cast: Michael Keaton, Nick Offerman, John Carroll Lynch, B.J. Novak, Kate Kneeland, Patrick Wilson, Linda Cardellini and Laura Dern.
Rating: Excellent.
John Lee Hancock, director of “The Blind Side” and “Saving Mr. Banks” brings “The Founder” and I have to say that not only I enjoyed this film but it´s a great one as well.
Based on true events, “The Founder” tells the story of Ray Kroc (Michael Keaton) a milkshake salesman who one day see´s a fast food stand in San Bernardino, California by the name of “McDonald´s”.
He then meets both the brothers Dick McDonald (Nick Offerman) and Mac McDonald (John Carroll Lynch). Kroc offers them to put franchises all over the country. At the beginning both the brothers are reluctant but at the end they accept Kroc´s idea.
Through a combination of ambition, persistence and ruthlessness, Ray Kroc built one of the world´s biggest and well known food chains: “McDonald´s”.
“The Founder” is a movie that tells the whole detailed story of how the empire of McDonald´s and the fast food business in America works.
The script by Robert D. Siegel, who wrote movies like “The Wrestler” and “Turbo” is written with so much detail and realism that you can tell that the movie took years on research of the origins of “McDonald´s” and it really paid off.
John Lee Hancock is a director who is well known of doing this type of films that involved iconic figures and real life characters did an amazing job with his cast and delivered full powerhouse performances.
Michael Keaton, who back in 2014 had his biggest comeback role with “Birdman: The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance” which led to him to an Academy Award Nomination for Best Actor does it again in this movie and gives a solid and amazing performance.
The supporting roles by both Nick Offerman and John Carroll do an amazing job as well on portraying two brothers in pursuit of a dream.
This type of movies they have the tendency to over explain elements and get to much into detail which is fine as long as you have a solid story and screenplay. One of the beautiful things that “The Founder” has is the fact that tells only the necessary details of the film and makes you feel engaged with the characters.
At the same time you feel a certain admiration to a struggling businessman like Ray Kroc was but at the same time you despise him for the fact of how he took advantage of the situation. But thanks to that ruthlessness and ambition founded one of the biggest and well known food chains around the world.
It´s a shame that “The Founder” is a movie that has not been considered for awards season since it had all the elements that qualify for a movie of this upcoming season.
Still “The Founder” is a must see and cannot miss this movie. It´s both well acted, well directed and beautifully written and I give it a huge recommendation.
I invite you to leave your comments at emilio.frenk@gmail.com or my twitter @FrenkEmilio.