Little-known nuggets about an American icon
‘The Founder’ turns up the heat on McDonald’s mogul Ray Kroc’s legacy. Our review
Ray Kroc may be somewhat ironically known as the founder of McDonald’s, but it would also be accurate to call him the Hamburglar.
Starring Michael Keaton as the famous Midwestern businessman, director John Lee Hancock’s The
Founder ( eeeE out of four; rated PG-13; in theaters nationwide Friday) is the rare biopic with a hero who’s also its greatest villain. An intriguing take on the genre that veers wildly away from its initial feel-good nature, The
Founder has its flaws — though not as many as its main subject — yet is an insightful look at the history of an iconic institution that doubles as a cautionary tale.
Before becoming a legend in fast-food manifest destiny, Ray struggles to hawk high-end milkshake machines until he meets the McDonald brothers, Dick (Nick Offerman) and Mac (John Carroll Lynch), with their innovative Southern California drivein restaurant in 1954.
In one of the film’s strongest sequences, Ray’s mind is blown by the siblings’ explanation of the popular eatery’s speedy, no-frills serving system and simplistic menu built around burgers and fries.
Ray immediately sees the franchise potential, with a vision of McDonald’s spreading “coast to coast, from sea to shining sea,” though his wife, Ethel (Laura Dern), is skeptical of the latest of his “revolutionary” investment ideas.
Financially strapped and desperate, Ray makes the hard sell to persuade the McDonalds to go into business with him, though when he feels as if he’s not making as much as the franchise owners, Ray swindles them to become the face of the country’s new culinary and cultural touchstone.
There is a certain jittery edginess to Keaton’s Kroc, but the actor imbues his character with such folksy likability that it’s a subtle turn from working-class go-getter to greedy bad guy. The viewer’s enmity for him slowly increases as the McDonalds’ beef with him grows.
The Founder is Offerman’s best role since his lovably cranky government official on TV’s Parks
and Recreation. Dick is off-putting, being the stickler for quality control — the opposite of Lynch’s big-hearted, extroverted Mac — yet you feel for him the most as the siblings become forgotten figures, even though it’s their name next to those golden arches.
Robert D. Siegel’s screenplay moves at a nice clip as Ray builds (and hungrily guards) his burgeoning empire, though it meanders with a subplot involving Ray’s bewitching future second wife, Joan (Linda Cardellini).
Hancock, with The Blind Side and Saving Mr. Banks on his résumé, again showcases a gift when it comes to chronicling complicated real-life characters, and that is Ray Kroc in a nutshell — or a Big Mac carton, as the case may be.
The tale of a man doing whatever he can to achieve the “American dream,” even if it means burying trusted colleagues and spurning loved ones, still feels timely some six decades later.
Whatever you think of the reallife eats, The Founder is a Happy Meal with some nice, needed bite.