Beyond the Sea: Movie & DVD Review (2004)

(Originally published 2004)

The Kevin Spacey movie, "Beyond the Sea," stars Spacey as Bobby Darin, the former pop star and teen idol doomed to death at age 9 by a doctor certain he wouldn't live past the age of 15.

Rheumatic fever nearly felled him, but thanks to the help of an enthusiastic stage mother (Brenda Blethyn) who encouraged his talent and made him believe he had the goods to be a star, Darin dug deep and found the pluck to live until age 37, when he died in 1973 after living life to its breaking point.

Now, in "Beyond the Sea," Darin's life is lived again - or at least a version of it is lived again. As directed by Spacey from a script he co-wrote with Lewis Colick, "Sea" is mined from Spacey's years of interest in Darin, the likes of which, it turns out, have a whiff of star worship and fantasy about them.

Spacey is 45 and looks it. In spite of that, he has cast himself as a man whose first hit song, "Splish Splash," was performed at age 22. I don't care how good your lighting is, how talented your cinematographer or how swell your cosmetic surgery went: Onscreen, 45 is only 22 if you have a burlap bag tied over your head.

Aware of this, Spacey contrives a movie-within-a-movie structure, with Darin looking back on his life from the viewpoint of an older man gleaning insight from his inner child, literally portrayed here by William Ulrich. It's all tricky, kitshy, hokey stuff, and I'd like to tell you it works, but unfortunately, it works only in parts.

Mirroring most biopics based on celebrities, "Beyond the Sea" follows its subject's rise to fame. It chronicles Darin's handful of pop hits, his marriage to actress Sandra Dee (Kate Bosworth), his Academy Award nomination for 1963's "Captain Newman, M.D.," his rage, his ego, his eventual undoing by the rapidly changing times.

As Spacey tells it, no accomplishment was ever too much to please Darin, whose insatiable drive was fueled by the lack of time he knew he had left as well as his eagerness to be bigger than his more talented contemporary, Frank Sinatra, a man he obviously tried to emulate.

It's also Darin's drive that strained his closest relationships, beginning with those who helped him reach the top, his manager, Steve (John Goodman), his brother-in-law, Charlie (Bob Hoskins), his sister, Nina (Caroline Aaron), and extending to Dee herself, who turned to booze and ciggies because life with Darin was at once too little and too much.

What ensues is a showy, energetic little soap opera whose best moments come when Spacey plays it straight. The whole inner child angle is a drag, it's clumsy and self-conscious. But when Spacey takes to the stage as Darin and sings, the movie floats.

Spacey has a good voice and charm to spare, but in spite of all the little dramas that pop up throughout, the film never really gets to the root of who Bobby Darin was. Was he the real thing, or just a performer crafted by system and the times? Spacey allows him to remain an enigma, which could have worked for a bigger star, but which here does the middling Darin no favors.

Though it likely wasn't Spacey's intent, it cheats Darin of leaving his mark.

Grade: C