MANK – Review

Class is now in session for Film History 101. And this will be on the final. Hopefully, that didn’t inspire too many nervous flashbacks, though I always looked forward to the few cinema courses I could take. Now the intro is spot on because this new film is mainly about another film that did make history, for lots of reasons. It truly stood out despite being produced during the second greatest year of Hollywood’s Golden Age (just two years after the prolific 1939). Yes, like 2012’s HITCHCOCK it is a biography of a very creative artist, but it focuses on one seminal work (PSYCHO for that earlier film). Oh, and instead of a director we now shine a much-deserved spotlight on the lowly, neglected writer, much like 2015’s TRUMBO. Well perhaps in this case not too neglected since he shared in the classic film’s only Oscar win. That iconic masterpiece is CITIZEN KANE, and its co-screenwriter is the talented Herman J. Mankiewicz, known to his many friends, and a few foes, as MANK.

Slow fade in on a dusty road near Victorville California early 1940s. A caravan of sedans pulls up to a rustic house just off a dirt road. It’s a place far away from the distractions of “Tinsel-Town”, ideal for the hard-drinking screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman). He’s been tasked to pen the movie debut of the current media darling, the 24-year-old “wunderkind” Orson Welles (Tom Burke). Along with “Mank” is one of the project’s producers John Houseman (Sam Troughton), a young typist/transcriber, British “war-bride” Rita Alexander (Lily Collins), and his personal nurse “Fraulein” Frieda (Monica Gossman), an essential aide after an auto accident (he was the unlucky passenger) has encased much of his lower body in plaster. Before leaving, Houseman phones Welles who shortens the deadline from 90 to 60 days. As Mank settles in, his mind recalls incidents from his movie work a decade prior. His nights back then are spent “in his cups” despite the efforts of his wife “poor” Sara (Tuppence Middleton). His hung-over days are confined to the legendary writers’ room at MGM under the watchful eye of its prickly, manipulative figurehead Louis B. Meyer (Arliss Howard). And despite his indulgences he becomes the adored friend and confidant of film star Marion Davies (Amanda Seyfried), not-so-secretly the “kept woman” of newspaper magnate William Randolf Hearst (Charles Dance). As the story bounces from the present to past and back again, Mack attends the lavish parties at Hearst’s San Simeon while learning of his host’s plan (helped by Meyer) to use staged propaganda newsreels to thwart Upton Sinclair’s campaign for governor. Eventually the drawbridge to Hearst Castle is closed to Mank. Could the Welles screenplay be his revenge against his former chums? As Mank denies this, will Davies really believe him? What of the efforts to shut down the production?  Will Mank be banned from the movie biz?

The title role provides a great showcase for the always compelling Oldman who plays Mank almost as a “world-weary” private eye who’d be a fixture in flicks later in that decade. Even in those flashbacks, we know that Mank’s been through enough heartache and disappointment to send most screenwriters off to the pawnshop to “hock” their typewriters. But as “down” as he gets, Mank still has the perfect verbal “burn”, which Oldman tosses off effortlessly. Despite his dour demeanor, Oldman shows us Mank’s humanity whether he’s helping out a panhandling pal or commiserating with screen royalty. Speaking of which, the film’s most delightful surprise is the dazzling turn by Seyfried as Davies. With her bright expressive eyes, she projects a magnetism that captivates everyone around her from lowly laborers to boozy writers to “gazillionaires”. Seyfried conveys her mischievous wit but really gets to the heart of her character as she opens up about her “beau”. It seems that the “princess locked in the tower” (she keeps a radio-telephone stashed away for private calls) is really in love with her “captor”. Let’s hope this leads to more frequent film roles for the talented Ms. S. As for the other women in Mank’s life, Collins is good as the no-nonsense assistant, but the role seems too similar to the secretary in Oldman’s DARKEST HOUR. Much the same can be said for Middleton who tries, often in vain, to steer her hubby away from her indulgent impulses. Troughton is perfectly prim and pompous as the stuffy Houseman, while Burke is the ultimate “big dog” treating every room as his theatre, as the bellowing Welles. And happily, there are some great villains for Oldman to confront. Howard’s Meyer projects a “kindly grandpa” persona that masks a cruel vindictive “penny-pincher”, while Dance is a looming, smiling cobra as Hearst, ready to strike at any affront, his venom poisoning his decadent opulent surroundings.

Director David Fincher, working with the screenplay by his late father Jack, has crafted a wonderful homage to the legacy of KANE while utilizing many of its techniques (the slow fade to black, focused foregrounds and backgrounds, high angle shots, etc.). Though there are a few movie trivia slip-ups (no Wolfman in the early 30s), most of the film lore is solid. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross contribute a lush, haunting score that has just a hint of Herriman. But the film’s greatest asset (aside from Oldman and Seyfried) may be the superb silvery black and white cinematography by Erik Messerschmidt with its languid deep shadows shattered by blazing white shafts of sunlight. He captures the glorious kitsch of Simeon while hinting that it may be a gilded gold prison in the future. The visuals make some of the pacing problems a bit more bearable. The whole “sacrificial lamb” to the power-grabbing duo subplot feels heavy-handed and obvious. Plus the countless scenes of a shuffling, drunken chain-smoking Mank with his comb-over dangling over one eye as he slurs sloshy soliloquies becomes repetitive as the film lurches slowly forward. At least we have ample time to gaze longingly at the fabulous fashions and aristocratic autos of the long-gone gods of the screen. MANK is an adoring, slightly bloated, look back at the creative process that birthed a true piece of cinema that will inspire generations to come.

3 out of 4

MANK is playing in select theatres and streams exclusively on Netflix beginning Friday, December 4^th, 2020.