The Last Glimmer

And yet. The movie stars Anthony Hopkins, William H. Macy, Helen Hunt, Freddy Rodríguez, Harry Belafonte, Heather Graham, Laurence Fishburne, Christian Slater, Martin Sheen, Elijah Wood, Ashton Kutcher and -- hold on, hold on -- Demi Moore, Lindsay Lohan and Sharon Stone.

There are 22 main characters and a dozen plot lines. No actor plays Kennedy, then 42 years old, who is spliced into the film with archived news clips and voice-overs from his inspirational oratory about hope and tolerance and compassion.

"Bobby" may turn out to be one of those love-it-or-leave-it type films. Kiss: "A passionate outcry for peace and justice in America that becomes deeply involving by the final climactic scene, overlaid with one of RFK's most stirring speeches," writes Deborah Young in Variety. Smack: "His movie ends up buried under its stifling good intentions and dire execution," says Jim Ridley of the Village Voice, who calls the result "awful."

And yet. Oscar buzz! The Los Angeles Times lists the film as a comer. Variety suggests that after its warm reception at the film festivals in Venice and Toronto it could be headed for Academy Award nominations.

That would be a comeback, considering the last major motion picture Estevez starred in was "D3: The Mighty Ducks" in 1996. There are those who say the only thing worse than starring in the first "Mighty Ducks" (a family blockbuster) is starring in the third, in which Estevez made only a brief appearance as Coach Bombay. During his decade in the wilderness, Estevez also directed a film, "The War at Home," that no one saw. "I was asking myself: What can I possibly do to make a living? Friends encouraged me to direct TV to keep my health insurance. Keep the bank from taking my house."

Seriously, the house?

In his youth, Estevez played leads in "The Outsiders," "Repo Man," "The Breakfast Club," "St. Elmo's Fire" and "Young Guns." The movies made a fortune. All gone?

"A high-profile marriage, high-profile divorce, that really cost me," he says. He was married to Paula Abdul, formerly the pop diva, currently the "American Idol" judge, from 1992 to 1994. "And those early films, I didn't make much, and the government takes half, agents get 10 percent, managers get 10 percent . . . ." He says, "No one beats you up more than yourself. You always remember the bad reviews, never the good ones. Why is that?"

He peers across the table. He is not asking the question rhetorically. "Why? Why do we gravitate to that?"

Because we secretly suspect all the bad things are true? He exhales. "My father told me you ought to thank all the people who made this so difficult. You were like Sinbad the Sailor fighting the seven monsters. I had to conquer the beasts."

At a news conference several days before the interview, Estevez described himself as "unapologetically earnest." Then he gave a little speech: "I believe the death of Bobby Kennedy was in many ways the death of decency in America. I think it was the death of manners and formalities, the death of poetry. I think it was the death of a dream." The assassination of Robert Kennedy, following the murders of his brother President John F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., was "the last straw," he said, "and we unraveled, culturally, at that point and went into a free fall. And I don't think we've completely put the pieces back together again."

(The first question from the entertainment press? What was it like for Estevez and Demi Moore to work together -- they play an unhappily married couple in the film -- after being engaged in real life during their Brat Pack days?) Why? Why did Emilio Estevez have to make an ensemble movie about the death of RFK -- starring Moore as a lounge singer/bitter crone with a drinking problem and Ashton Kutcher as a dope dealer with a headband who goes on an acid trip -- accompanied by sitar music?