"Who Do You Love?"

Wasn't able to make it to "The Secret Life of Bees" after all, thanks to long lines and horrid traffic everywhere.

Instead, I checked out "Who Do You Love," the biopic of music producer Leonard Chess, the man responsible for launching the careers of Bo Diddley, Muddy Waters, and Etta James. Though Chess was just a white, Jewish kid running a junkyard in the 1940s, he had an ear for musicians that changed the industry forever.

I have to admit, I generally shy away from biopics, particularly musical ones. And after last year's "Walk Hard" so perfectly parodied the genre, I was afraid I'd find myself giggling throughout this one.  However, "Who Do You Love" has two things going for it that changed my mind: Alessandro Nivola and Chi McBride.

Nivola has always been a fascinating presence on screen and not just because he's so damn pretty. He was wonderfully wounded and smarmy as Nicolas Cage's brother in "Face/Off" (where he had one of the coolest movie names of all time: Pollox Troy) and then turned around and made a charming scoundrel in the period piece "Mansfield Park." He's one of those actors I'll watch in anything. Seriously. I went to see "The Eye." Plus, he's married to the uber-cool Emily Mortimer, so you know he's awesome.

Chi McBride is finally getting some well-deserved attention for cutting through the sap with his no-nonsense humor on ABC's surreal series "Pushing Daisies." He's another one I'll watch in anything--even "Let's Go To Prison." He brings his trademark wit and gravitas to "Who Do You Love," playing Willie Dixon, the "mentor" to Nivola's Chess. (Asked what that means, Dixon replies: "I'm his guide into the exotic Negro world.")

The film hits all the standard plot points: there's a long-suffering wife, a hint of sibling rivalry, and scenes where racial tensions smoothed over by the universality of music. A lot of this gets surface treatment; several plot points are never actually resolved. And Nivola is just too darn likable to seem like a real bastard. But the film moves quickly and is brought to life by a game cast and tight direction from theatre vet Jerry Saks. As Muddy Waters, newcomer David Oyelowo is a real discovery...hopefully we'll have an interview here with him in the next couple days. It's a story we've seen before, but it still hits all the right notes.

-- Jenelle Riley