Movie Review - The United States Vs. Billie Holiday

Since 2021 began, we've seen several films that have been about the U.S. government going after high-profile African-American figures prior to the Civil Rights Act. The first was the documentary, MLK/FBI (2021), which was how the Federal Bureau of Investigation tried to discredit Martin Luther King, Jr. The second was Judas and the Black Messiah (2021), which was how the FBI again tried not only to discredit Fred Hampton, the Chicago leader of the Black Panther Party, but also arrest and eventually kill him. This is the third within only two months. Instead of the FBI, the government agency in question is the Federal Bureau of Narcotics or FBN. The FBN began in 1930 and ended in 1968, essentially becoming the Drug Enforcement Agency or DEA. Instead of high-profile men, the African-American in question here is Billie Holiday, the influential Jazz singer from the 1930's to 50's.

Like Judas and the Black Messiah, this film also has a good chunk of its running time devoted to the government using an undercover agent who infiltrates the inner circle of the high-profile African-American in question. It's also about that undercover agent developing feelings for the titular character before or even after having to betray that high-profile African-American. Arguably, Judas and the Black Messiah focuses more on the undercover agent, trying to understand why he would go undercover and why he would betray this high-profile African-American. That film succeeds in that understanding than this one. However, Judas and the Black Messiah fails in really digging into the high-profile African-American and having us really know him and his cause. This film balances or it tries to balance both perspectives, but it doesn't quite pull it off.

Andra Day is a R&B singer and songwriter whose debut album Cheers to the Fall (2015) was nominated for Best R&B Album and Best R&B Performance at the 58th Grammy Awards. She had a small role in the film Marshall (2017). She also performed on the song from that film called "Stand Up for Something," which was nominated for Best Original Song at the 90th Academy Awards. She sang that track alongside rapper Common at that Oscar ceremony, which obviously increased her fame. It upped her profile enough to get her this leading role, her first leading role, as Billie Holiday.

Like Kingsley Ben-Adir who played Malcolm X in One Night in Miami (2020), Day is playing an iconic real-life person who has been portrayed on screen by iconic actors. Diana Ross played Billie Holiday in Lady Sings the Blues (1972) for which she was nominated for Best Actress at the 45th Academy Awards. Audra McDonald played Billie Holiday in Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill (2016), a HBO film, based on McDonald's Tony Award-winning performance, a performance that also got her an Emmy nomination. It's hard to top Diana Ross and Audra McDonald, but Day certainly stands on her own as Ben-Adir certainly stood on his own. My hope was that Malcolm X might become the first African-American film character to be recognized twice at the Oscars, but if Billie Holiday is that African-American character, that would be appreciated as well.

Trevante Rhodes (Bird Box and Moonlight) co-stars as Jimmy Fletcher, the undercover agent, sent by FBN to infiltrate Billie's inner circle and help to take her down because the FBN like the FBI are operating under a racist ideology that Black people have to be kept down or stifled. Jimmy is a Black person himself and it's not as if Jimmy is blind to the racism that exists at the FBN and in the country at large, so it's never clear as to why he would go along with the FBN's pursuit of Billie Holiday.

Billie was a drug addict or certainly drug user who was arrested for possessing narcotics, but it's never established that Jimmy is really anti-drugs and is obsessed with eradicating how drugs is hurting the Black community. One would assume that's his stance because he works for the FBN, but doggedly pursuing one drug addict doesn't help to stop the drug problem at large. It doesn't stop the drug dealers or drug smugglers, so Jimmy's motivation never seems clear at first or even for most of the film. He's there to be a love interest for her that's conflicted between her world and the law enforcement world. Yet, his relationship is loosely based on reality and is mostly invented. Rhodes is a great and sexy actor but time devoted to him sidelines more reality-based romances that Billie Holiday had with people like Louis McKay, played by Rob Morgan (Just Mercy and Mudbound), or Tallulah Bankhead, played by Natasha Lyonne (Orange Is the New Black and Russian Doll). Seeing Billie's lesbian romance would have been better than watching the one with Jimmy.

Garrett Hedlund (Mudbound and Inside Llewyn Davis) also co-stars as Harry Anslinger, the real-life commissioner of the FBN. He's basically the racist villain who oversees Jimmy's undercover operation. He's one note and uninteresting. He's supposed to be the equivalent of both Jesse Plemons and Martin Sheen's characters in Judas and the Black Messiah. Unfortunately, Hedlund is nowhere near as engaging or entertaining as either of those two actors. Honestly, his character could have been excised completely and not detracted from the film at all.

The only worthy thing is watching Day's performance. There is a scene where we see her perform the song "Strange Fruit." It's a very powerful moment. As a whole though, it's not as imaginative as something like Rocketman (2019), so ultimately it ends with a shrug.

Rated R for language, strong sexuality and full-frontal nudity.
Running Time: 2 hrs. and 10 mins.

Available on Hulu.