Bombshell Cert: 15, 1hr 49mins
I first saw Bombshell a few weeks ago, and when I told people what a treat they had heading their way, they naturally wanted to know what it was about. When I told them ‘Roger Ailes… head of Fox News… sexual harassment scandal’, I quickly grew accustomed to two very different reactions.
Most would look at me completely blankly – ‘Roger who?’ they’d ask. The response from the remainder, however, was even more disconcerting. ‘Oh, Roger Ailes,’ they’d nod knowledgeably, ‘you mean the sleazy guy from The Loudest Voice?’
My turn to look blank.
Gretchen Carlson’s – played here by a seriously bewigged Nicole Kidman – liberal views became at odds with the conservative editorial line so aggressively set by Roger Ailes
Now, however, I’m all caught up and realise that Bombshell does have two big obstacles to overcome. First, a majority of cinemagoing Brits won’t know who he is or, indeed, who the female news presenters are whose sexual harassment claims – and accompanying lawsuit – cost him his career.
Second, however, is that a well-informed minority will think they’ve seen it all before because they’ve watched the mini-series that covers the same ground, and for which Russell Crowe recently won a Golden Globe.
Picking up three Oscar nominations this week (acting nods for Charlize Theron and Margot Robbie, and a deserved third nomination for the hair and make-up team), Bombshell is thankfully more than good enough to overcome both potential stumbling blocks.
John Lithgow (above with Charlize Theron) – virtually unrecognisable under a fat-suit and prosthetics to portray a character who is ‘old, fat and ugly’ – is fabulously repellent as Ailes
It’s energetic and, given the challenging subject matter, surprisingly entertaining – even funny at times. But when the difficult moments come, it’s brave, tense and hard-hitting too.
The end result is very good indeed, and all the better for sticking with a cleverly constructed screenplay that allows its central female characters to be properly flawed, and thus all the more believable, rather than giving them the usual saintly Hollywood polish.
You can tell that Theron, who also produces, has been one of the main driving forces behind the project.
You can tell that Theron, who also produces, has been one of the main driving forces behind the project. It falls to the real-life character she’s playing to set the high-octane scene
It falls to the real-life character she’s playing – political anchor-woman Megyn Kelly – to set the high-octane scene as she stalks the Fox newsroom, addressing herself straight to camera, letting us know where the real power lies (Ailes’s office, complete with private lift, is on the second floor, while the Murdochs are on the eighth) and setting the ambiguous, sexually charged tone.
‘Nice dress,’ notes a younger male colleague who passes her in the corridor.
‘Don’t worry,’ purrs Theron, Fleabag-style, to camera, ‘he’s not horny, he’s just ambitious.’
The scene in which he invites Kayla (Margot Robbie), a fictional amalgam of many of the women who fell into Ailes’s clutches, to raise her already short skirt ever higher is truly chilling
But it’s not Kelly who blows the whistle on Ailes’s harassment. That honour belongs to another real-life character, Gretchen Carlson, a former Miss America whose ever more liberal views became increasingly at odds with the unrepentantly conservative editorial line so aggressively set by Ailes.
Not for nothing was the station best known as Donald Trump’s favourite.
With her looks perceived to be fading and views diverging, Carlson – played here by a seriously bewigged Nicole Kidman – sensed what was coming and consulted lawyers.
So when she finally gets fired, she’s ready with a lawsuit, totally confident that many of her female colleagues will support her claims of sexual harassment. Only they don’t.
Mind you, Kelly is so busy being harassed and humiliated publicly by Trump, you can almost understand why. Almost.
John Lithgow – virtually unrecognisable under a fat-suit and prosthetics to portray a character who, by his own admission, is ‘old, fat and ugly’ – is fabulously repellent as Ailes.
His much-repeated mantra that ‘television is a visual medium’ has produced a channel of glass desks (all the better for seeing the women’s legs), a bullying insistence that female presenters wear short skirts rather than trousers, and given him the excuse to invite any naive young woman with ambitions to be on TV to ‘just give us a little twirl’.
The scene in which he invites the humiliated Kayla (Robbie), a fictional amalgam of many of the women who fell into Ailes’s clutches, to raise her already short skirt ever higher is truly chilling.
In the end it doesn’t matter that we insular Brits won’t know who many of these people are. This is a film that powerfully captures a key turning point in social history. Highly recommended.
ALSO OUT THIS WEEK
Just Mercy (12A)
Rating: 
Ever since Sidney Poitier and In The Heat Of The Night, young idealist black detectives and/or lawyers have been fighting injustice and racism in America’s Deep South.
This is very much in that cinematic tradition, with Creed star Michael B Jordan playing Bryan Stevenson who, fresh out of Harvard, arrives in Alabama to fight for black inmates on Death Row.
Walter McMillian, played here by Jamie Foxx, has been convicted on flimsy, even fabricated evidence. It’s hard-hitting stuff – all the more so for being based on a true story
Many, including Walter McMillian, played here by Jamie Foxx, have been convicted on flimsy, even fabricated evidence. It’s hard-hitting stuff – all the more so for being based on a true story – but director Destin Daniel Cretton, having certainly gained our attention, slowly loses it by flirting with cliché, over-indulging his actors and taking far too long to make his unarguable point.
Waves (15)
Rating:
Luce star Kelvin Harrison Jr plays Tyler, a black (and, yes, his ethnicity is important here) high-school student who seems to have it all. He’s from an affluent and supportive family, is the muscular star of the wrestling team and his cheerleader girlfriend is one of the prettiest girls at his Miami school.
But his God-fearing father is pushing him very hard, he’s hiding a secret shoulder injury and that pretty girlfriend thinks she might be pregnant. So his life is definitely not all good – a bit like this touching but overlong and somewhat melodramatic picture.
A Hidden Life (12A)
Rating:
Terrence Malick’s film has two big things going for it: it’s about that modern-day rarity, moral courage, and sees the maverick director returning not only to a true story but also one that has a beginning, middle and end.
A third plus is the stunning Austrian mountain scenery, where a young farming couple have to deal with the terrifying wartime consequences of the husband’s refusal to swear an oath of allegiance to Hitler.
A young farming couple (Valerie Pachner, above) have to deal with the terrifying wartime consequences of the husband’s refusal to swear an oath of allegiance to Hitler
It’s a deeply moving story but the ponderous pace, endless introspection and almost three-hour running time will definitely damage its commercial prospects.