Parents' Guide to Spinning Gold

This uneven and questionable labor of love about the writer-director's father will likely leave audiences with more questions than answers, perhaps wishing it had been a documentary. While it's common for biopics to have the blessing or cooperation of the subject's family and estate (Elvis, for example), it's rare for a biographical drama to be written, directed, and produced by the subject's child or children. Instead of lending the film more legitimacy, it ends up feeling more like a one-sided tribute than truth-telling. Timothy Scott Bogart has been trying to get a movie made about his father for decades; various big-name directors and actors were previously attached, but somehow he ended up making it himself with help from his siblings. The result is an underwhelming, occasionally tedious look at the producer, the label, and even the artists. Reportedly, a lot of factual liberties were taken to cement Bogart's reputation as a genius record-label founder -- after a while it seems like he's the Forrest Gump of an endless number of landmark musical moments -- but those embellishments are frankly unnecessary.

Jordan's performance is fine, but he struggles with the New York City accent, and his affect is overly mannered. Bogart's friends and associates are given so little to do that they don't merit much discussion despite being portrayed by familiar actors like Jay Pharoah and Dan Fogler. The musicians fare only marginally better, with Jason Derulo as Ron Isley, Casey Likes as Gene Simmons, Tayla Parx as Donna Summer, and Ledisi as Gladys Knight. If you choose to believe the film, Bogart was single-handedly responsible for inspiring many of these artists' best musical lines, titles, or riffs. But those claims aren't entirely credulous. For example, Summer was famously produced by Italian music producer Giorgio Moroder. But in a key sequence in Spinning Gold that deals with the production of the extended version of the sensual track "Love to Love You Baby," Moroder is erased in the studio -- instead, Bogart is there to personally arouse Summer enough to moan repeatedly throughout the chorus of the song (something that never actually happened). Despite the filmmakers' loving intentions, this story would have been better served being made by someone else or told in a different way.