Sunday, October 01, 2006

Movie Review: Hollywoodland

With any one critic, a fair amount of the time I'll have disagreements. Rotten Tomatoes aggregates many critics and gives you a percentage of favorable reviews. They give a fresh rating to any film with 60% favorable reviews and a rotten rating if it has less. I've found this to be the most reliable predictor for if I'll like a film. Hollywoodland got a 70% and I figured it would be good. Oh well, I (and Rotten Tomatoes) was wrong.

It had a lot of potential. It's a fictionalized investigation into the real life mysterious suicide of George Reeves who played Superman in the classic 1950s TV show. Ben Affleck plays Reeves shown in flashbacks and it's perhaps Affleck's best role. We learn that Reeves always saw himself as a more serious actor but was trapped by type casting. He had an open affair with a studio executive's wife played by Diane Lane (who does well in the role) and ultimately left her for another woman.

The film explores the 3 most likely causes of Reeve's death via Louis Simo, a fictional private investigator played by Adrien Brody. The film spends more than half the time on Simo's story including his ex-wife and son, other cases, and the various run-ins with people involved in the Reeves case. Brody does a fine job with Simo, but it's an overwritten part and is annoying.

The problem with the film is that Reeves' story is more interesting (probably because it's true) but it spends so much time on Simo. The result is a film that feels longer than it is and is frustrating because it doesn't give us what we want. The movie is at its worst when it tries to draw parallels between Simo's life and Reeves'.

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