Supersized Ego: "The Founder" compels from Michael Keaton's charismatic huckster turn

The Founder (2016) 

115 min.

Release Date: December 17, 2016 (Limited); January 20, 2017 (Wide)

Ray Kroc wasn’t the founder of fast-food chain McDonald’s or even the golden arch, but he was a huckster who pilfered someone else’s ideas after franchising the store. If one is expecting a teeth-out satire or a savage indictment akin to “Thank You for Smoking,” this isn’t that movie. A little soft but nonetheless compelling, “The Founder” has a slick, light touch from director John Lee Hancock (2013’s “Saving Mr. Banks”) and screenwriter Robert Siegel. Is Ray Kroc a terrible human being or just a ruthless business man? The Ray Kroc we meet at the beginning is not the same one at the end. A charismatic, live-wire twitchiness comes easy for Michael Keaton. Even as Ray Kroc becomes even more comfortable with his unscrupulous business sense as the film progresses, Keaton (much like Leonardo DiCaprio’s Jordan Belfort in 2013’s “The Wolf of Wall Street”) somehow has the ability to still make the viewer want to see how he gets away with his scheme. Keaton hardly needs it, but he is supported by a terrific cast. Nick Offerman and John Carroll Lynch are endearing and sympathetic as Dick and Mac McDonald; Laura Dern is fine but unchallenged as Ray’s long-suffering wife Ethel, who mopes for most of the film; and Linda Cardellini is as eye-catching as Ray Kroc thinks she is as his second wife Joan. True, “The Founder” could have packed a more blistering, less noncommittal point-of-view for there to be a harder punch in the end. At most, the film will guilt you for initially feeling for Ray Kroc and for craving a 15-cent hamburger made in the 1950s.

Grade: B