Mank 2020
This Netflix movie has gotten some very good reviews, so I wanted to see it before I try to finish a 2020 Top 10 list. I’ve always thought Gary Oldman overplays his parts, or maybe just takes oversized roles, and this movie certainly confirms that. The movie is mostly him playing a smart aleck drunk writer, making some admittedly clever observations and puns. And that is almost the whole movie. In the meantime he is writing Citizen Kane and the movie flashes back to a few years earlier during a time when he gets to know William Randolph Hearst. Citizen Kane is a great movie, probably better known and more relevant today than William Randolph Hearst in a lot of ways. We don’t really get to know Hearst at all. And we hardly get to know MGM founders Louis B. Mayer and Irving G. Thalberg, though they are here, along with Orson Wells, of course, and John Houseman, who I didn’t realize worked so closely with Wells. But I don’t feel like you get to know anyone in the movie except for Herman Mankiewicz and, as I said, it is really mostly him commenting on people and events, with an oversized performance by Oldman playing a drunk. The movie gives some fun insight into Hollywood of the 30’s and 40’s, but the plot itself isn’t that intricate. Then the characters aren’t fleshed out that well, so I was a little disappointed and felt like I waited a long time for it to get going, which never really happens. It is neat to watch, filmed in black and white to look like Kane and it is kind of an interesting story, but just hard to make an entire movie about writing a script. Hollywood loves movies about Hollywood, so it could still do pretty well during awards season.
Written: 08 Feb 2021