Tag Archives: Gary Oldman

Mank

7 Dec

‘Mank’: Drunken Hollywood hired gun careens into shooting a classic, and Fincher follows him

By Tom Meek
Friday, December 4, 2020

There’s a scene in Thomas Vinterberg’s recently released “Another Round” in which Mads Mikkelsen’s teacher asks his students what kind of person they’d want to hang out with: a vodka-swilling, late-night carouser, a closet beer-nipping infirm or a hyper-serious teetotaler. The class for the most goes for door No. 1 – Winston Churchill. FDR is the second, who receives some love. The one who receives no votes, and a raucous cheer of relief when his identity is revealed, is no other than Adolf Hitler. The infamous icon of tyranny and extreme racism curiously also makes an indelible mark in “Mank,” the latest from visual stylist David Fincher, in a conversation between Herman Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman, the Mank in question), studio head Louis B. Mayer (Arliss Howard, playing that final M in MGM) and newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst (Charles Dance, who worked with Fincher on his first film, “Alien3”). Talking about renowned socialist and writer Upton Sinclair running for governor of California in 1934, Hearst dismisses the “Oil!” author (the basis for the Paul Thomas Anderson film “There Will Be Blood”)  as a person not to be taken seriously – like Hitler. Sinclair loses a close race, and we all know the evils Hitler went on to enact.

The scene is important because it casts a strong contrast between the washed-up writer Mank, a journo turned Hollywood hired gun, and the powerful Hearst, who would become the alleged subject of Mank’s pen for Orson Welles’ iconic American classic, “Citizen Kane.” In 1942, the revered film would win an Oscar only for best screenplay (John Ford’s “How Green Was My Valley” beat it for best pic). Mankiewicz and Welles shared the co-credit, and over time there have been debates over just how much either man contributed to the then 24-year-old Welles’ directorial debut. Fincher’s take, coming from a script by his late father Jay (he passed in 2003, and this is his only credit), makes no quibbles that it’s nearly all Mank. But the film’s less about the penning of the instant classic and more about the sands of power in Hollywood – a quagmire that ensnares, more than Mank, kid brother Joseph L. Mankiewicz (Tom Pelphrey), who would go on to direct “All About Eve” (1950) and “Sleuth” (1972). Mank’s got one foot in and one foot out, and a broken leg from a car crash and a penchant for the sauce throughout as he navigates the studio lot that Mayer runs like an episode of Trump’s “Apprentice.” There’s so much wrapped up in Welles’ promising debut that the affable John Houseman (Sam Troughton) is brought in to keep him sober and focused. Then there’s also the women who play muse to Mank, including Hollywood it girl of the time Marion Davies (Amanda Seyfried), the nurse who helps mend him back to health (Monika Gossmann) and overly patient wife (Tuppence Middleton).

It’s hard to believe that Fincher, who used to make a living shooting Loverboy and Madonna videos, has made only 11 films to date, with “Fight Club” (1999) and “The Social Network” (2010) as well as the underappreciated TV series “Mindhunter” as some of the shinier jewels. It’s been six years since his last, “Gone Girl”; this is an obvious labor of love, an ode to his father and the (for better or worse) heyday of big studio Hollywood. It’s shot in opulent black and white by Erik Messerschmidt, which feels like an apt choice and is accompanied by a period appropriate score with a bit of a haunting modern edge by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, who have teamed with Fincher on numerous occasions and won for “The Social Network.” The real key to the success of “Mank,” however, is Oldman, who won an Oscar for his performance as British boozer Winton Churchill in “The Darkest Hour” (2017). He’s an actor who can slide seamlessly into any genre and any role and make it his own, as well as disappear into the character – he does it again here and should almost certainly be in the conversations about the finest thespian turns of 2020. Howard as Mayer is a force in his own right and a perfect grinding board for the boozy Mank. Fincher, Oldman and Howard, et al., embrace and relish the golden era, but not without shining lights into the dark corners of filmmaking power and the politics of the time.

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The Laundromat

10 Oct

‘The Laundromat’: We go through a spin cycle while Soderbergh cleans house on bad finance

By Tom Meek

Image result for the laundromat

Steven Soderbergh’s films have always been stacked with panache and verve. Take the mod hipness of “Out of Sight” (1998) or the “Ocean’s” films, let alone bigger, more serious affairs such as “Erin Brockovich” and “Traffic” – both made in 2000 and both striking Oscar gold – in which the filmmaker’s wry, slick sarcasm still manages to work its way up and out. That’s why taking in “The Laundromat” is somewhat disconcerting: It’s got style and sass for sure, but it’s someone else’s pen that Soderbergh’s wielding, most conspicuously that of Adam McKay, who inked quick irreverent, knee-jerk changeups into “The Big Short” (2015), the artfully outrageous dissection of the subprime housing collapse.

“The Laundromat” too is about a financial fissure in America, though it’s a more intimate and less grand affair than “The Big Short” and employs loosely bound segments (Secret 1, 2, 3 and so on) to bring you the not-so-great news. The first segment, “The Meek Are Screwed,” obviously caught my eye. The meek are mentioned relentlessly throughout the film, lemmings we should care deeply about no matter how many go over a cliff at the promise of financial security and greener pastures (the American Dream; nay, scheme). The first meek we meet are a retired couple, Ellen Martin (Meryl Streep) and her husband, Joe (James Cromwell), who take a pleasure cruise across the placid waters of Lake George. There’s an accident, Joe doesn’t make it and Ellen, who thinks she’s going to buy a condo in the sky, drink mai tais and watch the sun rise, is in for a rude awakening. The insurer of Joe’s policy is a mailbox somewhere in Nevis with funnel after funnel to shell corporations elsewhere. It’s a maddening, endless web of paper that if put into boxing terms might be Ali’s infamous rope-a-dope – you can slug away all you want, but in the end you’re exhausted and primed for a knockout.

Ellen’s a slugger. And over the course of what amounts to a long, drawn-out bout, you begin to really admire her moxie. She starts with that mailbox, which belongs to a somber, cagey gent named Boncamper (Jeffrey Wright), whose personal life proves nearly as dubious as his dealings. Ellen may be grasping at straws, but Soderbergh and screenwriter Scott Z. Burns follow the trail with the same diligence they tracked the source of a lethal pathogen in the pandemic thriller “Contagion” (2011). Along the path we get myriad digressions, be it a corrupt and extremely rich African ex-pat named Charles (Nonso Anozie) philandering poolside with his daughter’s college roommate, two naive Americans slugging tequila in the wrong Mexican cantina or the British businessman (Matthias Schoenaerts) who tries to shake down a Chinese matriarch on her home turf – not a good strategy.  

It turns out all roads lead to Panama (yes, this is the saga of the infamous Panama Papers, that if not for Wikileaks and the subprime debacle might have been more boldly underscored in history books) and there we get the cherry duo of Ramón (Antonio Banderas) and Jürgen (Gary Oldman), law partners at a firm that manages nearly 25,000 shell companies who provide the kind of aside insights that Margot Robbie did from a hot tub in “The Big Short.” The pair are dashing, charming, and you’re thrown into a trance every time they rationalize the state of the universe with a shrug and wry smile. Their smugness is intoxicating, but it’s hard to root for the shell gamers as they inflict pain and suffering upon the meek with their “just bending the rules” machinations. The charismatic actors forge devilish chemistry too, twirling around each other like Fred and Ginger; Oldman, who won an Oscar last year for playing Churchill, gets to take a German accent out for a spin. For the most, he handles the curves nicely, but in the pit he lays it on a bit thick.

As things come full cycle, Soderbergh and Burns suddenly seem to be at a loss. Perhaps they should have done more with Sharon Stone’s persnickety real estate agent in a clingy sequin dress, or David Schwimmer’s boat operator, royally screwed by big insurance. But no, as this “Laundromat” closes we get put through the ideological wringer as the fourth wall is kicked down for a dour dose of pedagogy that’s meant to incite. Unfortunately, all the lazy symbolism does is agitate and bleach out what had been a luridly piquant sojourn to Central America and other unsavory ports of global corruption.

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