Don Cheadle aims to entertain with Miles Davis' biopic

The talented Don Cheadle not only stars in this wild and impressionistic biography of jazz musician/composer Miles Davis - easily one of the most influential and original musicians of the last century - he also cowrote it, coproduced it and directed it (his directorial debut).

Perhaps that explains why "Miles Ahead" comes so close to being an insightful window into the life and soul of this amazing musician, but remains a superficial, furiously episodic examination of one more musical barrier-breaker succumbing to drugs, alcohol, womanizing and turbulent relationships.

Here, the director, the star and the (co)writer couldn't provide the usual checks and balances they might find on other film sets.

"Miles Ahead" skips over Davis' early life (he was born in downstate Alton to a blues pianist mother before moving to East St. Louis) and picks up with the adult trumpeter (Cheadle) chiding one of the most unethical reporters on the music beat, Dave Braden (Ewan McGregor), for lacking attitude.

The movie doesn't have this problem. There are gunshots, cars chases and moody swings as Davis teams up with Braden for an "After Hours"-like tour through a shady world of music, politics and capitalism, capped by the revelation that Davis has completed a secret session tape, a jazz holy grail everyone is chasing, and Davis is hiding.

Then, somebody steals it.

That Cheadle didn't want "Miles Ahead" to be a conventional tragic musician biopic ("I Saw the Light" anyone?) is admirable.

So, instead of "Miles Ahead" resembling a conventional tragic musician biopic, it looks and feels more like a crack-induced 1980s buddy-action movie.