This is a
film with a good “Oscar narrative.”
Films about journalism has a history of doing well (All the President’s Men, Spotlight,)
it has excellent pedigree (Spielberg, Hanks, Streep,) and with a story about
government pushback against freedom of the press, it’s incredibly timely in a
political year when that’s increasingly important. However, while it’s a good film, it’s not a
stellar one, and it’s reasonable to me that it only received two major Oscar
nominations.
In 1971,
the Washington Post gets wind that
the New York Times has acquired pages
from a classified decades-long study on the Vietnam War. After their first publication, the Times is slapped with an injunction by
the Nixon administration. The Post has a reporter who thinks he knows
the source of the leak, and with the Times
temporarily barred from printing anything further on the Pentagon Papers, the Post scrambles to get their hands on the
documents and publish within their limited window of opportunity.
It’s an
interesting story, a classic David-and-Goliath dynamic between the intrepid
journalists and the secretive, controlling administration. The drama is heightened by a clash between
editor Ben, ambitious and eager for the paper to stand its ground, and owner
Kay, who’s wary of taking big risks when the company is on the verge of going
public. There are clandestine meetings
with secret sources, clever journalists combing through mountains of documents,
and big speeches on censorship and freedom of the press. Throw in direction by Steven Spielberg and a
slew of strong performances (Tom Hanks as Ben and Meryl Streep as Kay are the
heavy hitters, but the film also features Bob Odenkirk, Sarah Paulson, and
Matthew Rhys,) and all the elements seem right.
However,
for me, those elements add up to a movie that feels good instead of
excellent. For one, it’s not long, but
it feels long. While the script has some fine dialogue and a
handful of really terrifically-written scenes, the overarching story is written
in such a way that it drags when it really shouldn’t. The structure is just set up kind of weird,
and even when compelling things are happening onscreen, I still get the urge to
check my watch. This makes it feel a bit
more like “homework viewing,” an issue Oscar films can sometimes have, rather
than just watching a great movie.
Honestly, I wouldn’t have been too surprised if Streep’s lead actress
nod had been the film’s only major nomination – if it were up to me, I don’t
necessarily think I’d have given it a nod for best picture.
Additionally,
I’m not a fan of the overall handling of Kay’s story. There are interesting threads here – as the
first female owner of a newspaper, she gets tons of condescending pushback from
her all-male board, and she approaches the question of the Pentagon Papers with
the full knowledge that the wrong decision could destroy the company her family
built. And in all fairness, there are a
few really strong scenes that address these aspects. Too often, though, the film is content to
leave these things on the backburner and frame Kay more as a rather timid,
indecisive ogre standing in the way of Ben’s journalistic greatness. I think it could have been written in a way
that gives more weight to Kay’s perspective/experience, and I think the film
could have been a lot more interesting for it.
Warnings
Language,
drinking/smoking, brief war violence, and thematic elements.
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