One of the most controversial biopics ever made was based on the equally controversial book by famed Watergate journalist Bob Woodward. Such was the anger at how Belushi would be portrayed that lawsuits were filed, offices trashed and funding withheld by studios fearing a backlash from the powerful Creative Artists Agency. They needn’t have bothered. The film itself ensured hardly anybody saw it.

Which is a pity, for there are many good things in the film, chief amongst them Michael Chiklis’s portrayal of John Belushi.  But it is all undone by two fatal framing devices. The first of these has Belushi guided through his past life by a Puerto Rican taxi-driving angel, annoyingly performed by Ray Sharkey. The second features J.T. Walsh as Bob Woodward investigating Belushi’s death. While this enables entertaining recreations from Belushi‘s life, it also facilitates tasteless fantasy segments of his death.

The resultant mess has the two converging near the film’s end with Woodward standing over a dying Belushi, dispassionately telling the comedian he was responsible for his own death. Prior to this the pair almost meet, sort of, on a Los Angeles street as present day Woodward drives alongside flashback Belushi!

In the back of the car, the angel informs the dead Belushi that Woodward is going to do for him what he did for Nixon.  Despite its best efforts, this biopic even fails this modest goal.