Don Cheadle's MILES AHEAD gives us some fun, along with a fantasia on Mr. Davis' life

From the opening credits of MILES AHEAD, the new movie co-written (with Stephen Baigelman), directed and starring Don Cheadle, we learn that Miles Davis Properties LLC , a company controlled by some of the late Miles Davis' family members, was involved (TrustMovies suspects rather heavily) in the overseeing of this film. One cannot blame family for doing its utmost to burnish a legend's image -- the man and his music -- but I wonder if it can be trusted to offer up anything approaching "reality" about the subject at hand?

Not that Mr. Cheadle's movie (the actor/filmmaker is shown above and elsewhere below) doesn't give us the kind of warts-and-all biopic audiences have come to expect these days, but at the end of it all, we do have that kind of queasy feeling that we ought to understand that Davis' music excuses just about anything and everything.

So, yes, this is indeed yet another movie about a music personality who is egotistical, brilliant, drunk and drugged-out and very self- and other-destructive. The difference is that it stars Mr. Cheadle, who is always a joy to watch, and it is -- from what I can gather -- almost totally invented in terms of the plot line, which involves a supposed reporter (played by Ewan McGregor, below), who, in attempting to to get an interview with Davis, himself becomes involved in trying to get back a stolen tape recording of the musician's latest work.

This is fun and games, I suppose, and acted quite well by all concerned, but what's the point? Unless it is designed to somehow show us the "real" Davis by giving us invented narrative over the usual bio-pic documentary fodder. Well, it's an odd choice, but it's one that does provide the opportunity for a little wit and surprise, along with all else.

There's gunplay and beatings and a car chase and a bunch of shady characters, as the movie circles in and around on itself. becoming a kind of fantasia that culminates in a whoop-dee-do prize fight that descends into music and melodrama and murder. In another unusual scene, the dialog during a argument/fight between Miles and his wife (played with feisty beauty by Emayatzy Corinealdi, above and below) is literally overcome, as is so much else here, by the music itself.

In its period detail, the movie gets the "look" down pat -- from the hairdos and cars to the clothes and home decor -- and the supporting cast (which includes the wonderful Michael Stuhlbarg in another fine role) is certainly on target. And the movie does have a genuinely interesting construction: flashing from present to past, with the music always at the periphery and occasionally front and center, and circling back on itself as it bounces back and forth from here to there and now to then. But for all that bouncing, what comes up is too often the usual stuff of cliched musical biopic: a life of drugs, dames and bad behavior.

At both the beginning and end of the film we do get a kind of "interview" with Davis, as performed by Cheadle, in which he tells us that his music is not "jazz" but something he prefers to be called "social music" (as if all music ever composed -- from opera to the Twist -- wasn't in some sense social music). Clearly, Davis was some kind of control freak, a quality that Cheadle captures with spirit and intensity .

From Sony Pictures Classics and running 100 minutes, the film, while playing New York and Los Angeles, opens all across the country tomorrow, Friday, April 22. Here in South Florida, it plays everywhere from Aventura to Boca Raton, Hollywood to Miami, Coconut Creek to Pompano Beach. Click here to see all playdates, cities and theaters.

Brendan Gleeson & Don Cheadle shine in the other McDonagh's delicious THE GUARD -- plus a very short Q&A with these three

Can "tone" alone carry a movie? I wouldn't have said so until faced with THE GUARD, the new film written and directed by John Michael McDonagh. Now I must say, 'Sure -- but unless you're this particular McDonagh, I wouldn't risk it." John Michael, you see, is the brother of the more famous playwright and screenwriter (In Bruges) Martin McDonagh. Yet their work -- on the basis of these two films, at least, and while deal-ing with drugs, death and duplicity in a comedic vein -- could hardly be more different. For TrustMovies' taste, Martin is overly assertive, a verbal show-off in extremis, while brother John comes at you sideways, under the radar and a lot more quietly.

The movie begins with a verbal fuck and a bang, and just when we're saying to ourselves, "Well, we've seen this before!", thanks to the sightly bizarre but just-right acting moment from star Brendan Gleeson, we quickly realize that, no, we haven't. And then there are those green walls -- in Gleeson's bedroom, and in the home of the first of several dead people that the movie visits. In the Q&A with the director, McDonagh, shown at left, allowed that he had chosen that green on purpose -- just to give a different spin to things. It certainly works.

But then just about everything does in this enchanting movie about drugs, betrayal,  murder and other bad things. The filmmaker takes all these, and layers them with comedy. This combo of comedy and dark deeds is not particularly new. Atop all this, it's as though Tinkerbell had entered unnoticed with a handful of pixie dust and tossed it over the entire proceedings. Oh, you can see neither Tink nor the dust, but they're there, all right -- in the singular tone of the film. While dealing with the most awful occurrences, McDonagh is almost gentle, kindly, dear.

Note the scene in which the villains (well, some of the villains) must do away with Gleeson's cop partner (a lovely performance from Rory Keenan, above, right, with Gleeson). I believe you will not have seen anything quite like the quirky, melancholy sadness produced by these few moments.

The villainous but philosophy-quoting threesome themselves are somewhat melancholic (the director noted in the Q&A that he wanted them that way), but as played to a fare-thee-well by (left to right, above) David Wilmot, Liam Cunningham and the ubiquitous Mark Strong, they are memorable. Likewise the pair of hookers with whom Gleeson spends his day off: This scene is sweet as pie and -- thanks to the work of the three actors involved -- utterly believable, too.

Fionnula Flannigan (above, right), as Gleeson's dying mom, does her usual fine work, as does relative newcomer and eastern European actress Katerina Cas as Gleeson's partner's "arranged-marriage" bride. Calexico provide the very nice musical score,

The movie is being made much of as a fish-out-of-water, opposites-attract, buddy movie, and yes, it's all that. Yet even with the super-pro work of the two leads (Don Cheadle, above, with less screen time, still registers very strongly), this is at heart an ensemble piece, with the voice and tone of the screenwriter in the catbird seat. The movie is alternately weird, funny, exciting and sad -- all of which you often get in the comedic-crime genre. What you can't get, except here, is the... well, call it the state of grace that seems to waft lightly over everything. Thank you, Mr. McDonagh.

The Guard, 96 minutes, from Sony Pictures Classics, opens Friday, July 29 in New York (at the AMC Empire 25, Angelika Film Center and Lincoln Plaza Cinema and in Los Angeles at The Landmark  -- and in the weeks to come at various Laemmle Theaters.

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At the Q&A with Gleeson (bluff, pleasantly gruff and full of life) and Cheadle (slight, svelt and exceedingly dapper), both men were in fine form and talked about how enjoyable it was to work together. My question concerned whether or not they realized, upon reading the script just what kind of tone the movie would eventually have. Both men agreed that, yes, that tone was indeed there on the page, and so the movie resulting from it was no surprise to either of them.

McDonagh was quieter, as writer/directors often are, but seemed a surprisingly generous fellow. He noted that he particularly enjoyed giving all the actors in the film a visual as well as a "name" credit at the film's finale. (This is a very generous thing to do for actors, and a nice help to the audience in identifying who they have just seen.)  To my question about the enchanting quality of his movie, the director allowed that, yes, he does have a quieter tone, and that he trying to upend much of the stuff we viewers usually see in cop movies and crime investigations.  In fact, he would deliberately do the opposite of much that occurs in these films, just to see what would happen. Fortunately the actors were happy to go along with him, and the resulting film bears out his theories.