Decker

This is a new film that's getting a lot of Oscar buzz and drawing comparisons to The Insider for obvious reasons (it's another movie about 60 Minutes dealing with a controversy and then backing off their position).


Here's what Hollywood-Elsewhere's Jeffery Wells had to say after seeing it at the Toronto Film Festival :

Truth Reviews Are True — It’s A Knockout Surprise

24 hours ago I was nursing a vague suspicion that James Vanderbilt‘s Truth (Sony Pictures Classic, 10.16) might be a shortfaller or not-so-hotter of some kind. The advance word had been dicey, and then Sony Pictures Classics didn’t open it at Telluride, which struck several know-it-alls as curious. Then it screened last night in Toronto and everything changed. Now Truth is regarded as a major bulls-eye journalism drama and a likely (or certainly formidable) Best Picture contender.



An exacting, well-ordered account of the Rathergate episode of ’04, Truth is easily as good as Michael Mann‘s The Insider. It has the same kind of disciplined, upscale vibe. It’s also a thematic equal of that 1999 drama as both are about real-life stories for CBS’s 60 Minutes that were challenged, watered-down or otherwise diminished by CBS corporates. Obviously not without fault in the case of Truth but still…

Cate Blanchett‘s flinty, tough-as-nails performance as former 60 Minutes producer Mary Mapes easily puts her into the Best Actress race (it actually nudges aside her Carol performance, incredible as that may sound). Robert Redford‘s performance as former CBS anchor-reporter Dan Rather is confined to a few scenes, but it’s one of the most pared-down and appealing things he’s done in a long time — he glows with dignity and grace. Costars Topher Grace, Dennis Quaid, Elisabeth Moss, Bruce Greenwood, David Lyons and John Benjamin Hickey all deliver like champs.

It’s very unusual for a first-time director like Vanderbilt to display these kinds of chops, but that’s what he’s done here. The structure, timing, tension and pitch of this film are all spot-on. Mandy Walker‘s widescreen cinematography, the editing by Richard Francis-Bruce, Brian Tyler‘s score — all ace-level.

Pic is a dramatization of Mapes’ 2005 memoir “Truth and Duty: The Press, the President, and the Privilege of Power.” It’s basically about how and why Mapes and Rather lost their jobs in the wake of a 2004 60 Minutes report about a young George Bush having allegedly received preferential treatment in an attempt to duck military service in Vietnam.



This feel-bad journalism drama is also a kind of companion piece to Tom McCarthy‘s Spotlight, which is on the opposite end as everything in that Boston-based tale works out more or less positively, and journalistic reporting at least temporarily rights wrongs and malignant forces are embarassed or sent into hiding. Not so much with Truth, which starts intriguingly and then turns iffy and then dark, sad and finally tragic. The good guys (even if they shot themselves in the foot by sourcing the infamous Killian documents) lose and the bad guys win.

And yet Truth examines all aspects of this story from all sides. It’s not some kneejerk liberal defense of Mapes and Rather, although it’s clear to any fair-minded person that the story in question was essentially accurate.

When Truth opens next month you can bet that the nutter right will dive again into this controversial 60 Minutes segment and spread their usual bullshit. Aired on 9.8.04, the much-criticized, clearly flawed segment led to the resignation of Mapes and other CBS News producers and executives in its wake, and Rather the following year.

The segment explored former President George W. Bush‘s dubious record of military service in the early ’70s, and leaned heavily on documents that allegedly came from the files of Bush’s commanding officer, the late Lieutenant Colonel Jerry B. Killian. They claimed that young Bush, then in his late 20s, swaggered around like an entitled fratboy and at one point disobeyed a direct order to take a physical.

The documents had been delivered to CBS from former Texas Army National Guard Lt. Colonel Bill Burkett. Soon after the airing it was determined that the documents had been forged. There’s no question that using illegitimate documents to support a news story is a terrible strategy. And yet a week later Rather interviewed Marion Carr Knox, secretary of Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, and Ms. Knox said two things: (1) the memos shown by 60 Minutes on September 8, 2004 are not authentic and yet (2) the content of the documents was accurate.


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The key defense or explanation here is in what Ms. Knox says in the above Rather interview. Credible journalism should never lean on a “bad documents, accurate story” rationale, but this was one of those times when such an explanation carried weight.

The righties will nonetheless assert that the entire segment was inaccurate or invented, and they will be dead wrong and/or lying through their teeth when they do that. Some of these very same rightwing dickheads have advance-trashed Truth on this site (particularly BadHatHarry) and predicted it would be problematic. They were absolutely dead wrong, either due to an insufficient brain-cell count or flat-out lying for the sake of a rightist agenda. In my eyes these fellows have eternally discredited themselves.

And I really don’t get why SPC played its cards close to its chest. By not debuting Truth in Telluride they seemed to suggest that they didn’t quite have a blue-ribbon award-season flick on their hands. SPC is famously bonded with Telluride. It’s always been the launch pad for their award-season ponies. And yet you they didn’t open Truth there. When I got to Telluride everyone was saying ‘why is SPC’s Telluride slate so weak this year?….just Son of Saul and nothing else?’

It turns out that Truth, which screened for buyers over three months ago, was only just finished last week. Apparently there was some last-minute vetting of facts going on. Either way SPC decided to play “hide the ball”, and now they’ve got a huge winner that everyone is surprised about. Brilliant game on their part. Brilliant but curious, I mean.

Solid Snake

Hmph. Interesting. I think I remember watching that Rather bit during that time.

Decker

Well, it took them long enough, but they finally released a trailer for Truth. It looks amazing. I'm so in now.

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Decker

Not that I ever actively watch that swill, but I'm unfortunate enough to be around TVs with Fox News on a lot and it seems they have their claws out on this movie. They bring in "experts" to debunk the movie and it seems they come back to that the documents were fraudulent and that Mapes hasn't worked in TV since "and for good reason!", as if those facts are not blatently clear in the movie (or even the trailer). They show a clip from Rather's apology as well. Then they act astounded that Cate Blanchette would be playing Mapes as if that glorifies what went on. It's pretty clear that they want to give this movie the "Hurricane/Zero Dark Thirty" treatment -- discrediting the source material as inaccurate to kill its Oscar chances. Ridiculous.

Decker

I guess the discrediting of this movie is now a big thing. Read this on Hollywood-Elsewhere :

Truth Torpedo #2 = Hull Is Already Taking on Sea Water

Ten days ago an HE headline asked if James Vanderbilt‘s Truth (Sony Pictures Classics, 10.16) was being “Zero Dark Thirty‘d” — i.e., relentlessly fired upon and controversial-ized for not presenting facts in a way that certain critics prefer, and thereby tarnished as a hot-potato movie that Academy voters may come to regard askance. The answer is yup, uh-huh, you betcha — the film is being ZD30‘d and torpedoed and what-have-you. Scott Feinberg‘s 9.17 Hollywood Reporter hit piece started things off, and yesterday a N.Y. Post slapdown article by Kyle Smith threw another log on the fire.


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The attacks will continue and this somewhat melancholy, well-crafted and extraordinarily complex film will almost certainly be discredited by industry milquetoasts as a Best Picture contender for a very simple reason, and the kneejerk simplicity of this reason is why I just used the phrase “will almost certainly be discredited.”

The reason, I suspect, is that most critics and journalists will decide they can’t afford to support Truth because to do so would be seen as an endorsement of the incomplete vetting of the infamous Killian documents that were used in a 9.8.04 60 Minutes episode that explored whether George W. Bush received preferential treatment during his National Guard service in the early ’70s. So just as CBS felt it had no choice but to bow to the Republican attack machine by throwing producer Mary Mapes (Cate Blanchett) and Dan Rather (Robert Redford) under the bus, journalists and critics will dismiss Truth because to give it a thumbs-up would allow any critic or enemy who pops up down the road to call their journalistic standards into question.

The fact that Mapes’ Bush story was essentially true is of little concern now or then; the fact that the documents may (emphasis on that word) have been forged or copied is everything. That is how the game of journalism works.

So unless a vigorous defense is immediately mounted by Sony Pictures Classics and Vanderbilt and their allies, the “word” will continue to spread and Truth will be dismissed, save for the praise coming from this corner and from Sasha Stone and a few other fans. Truth won’t open for another couple of weeks and the game is all but over, trust me, unless SPC and Vanderbilt come out guns blazing like the Wild Bunch, and unless they keep firing for the next three or four weeks at least. You can’t just put out a press release and let it go at that.

It would be incomplete to not at least mention that Sony Pictures Classics co-honchos Michael Barker and Tom Bernard are not what anyone would call scrappy combatants or “guns blazing” types, but sometimes people will surprise you. Who knows? Then again Sony Corporation publicists famously didn’t put up a fight three years ago when Zero Dark Thirty came under attack; they apparently felt that controversy would scare audiences away. They may have been right for all I know, but I also know that they allowed the film to be tarnished by not challenging the Stalinist-left assertion that film endorsed torture.

The main plot point in Truth, to repeat, is an apparent procedural failure to fully vet the infamous Killian documents by 60 Minutes producer Mary Mapes for a story that explored whether George W. Bush received preferential treatment during his National Guard service in the early ’70s. The film is a fascinating account of a journalistic meltdown, of a slow sense of more and more hands tightening their grip around a reporter’s neck, and of corporate types almost instinctually deciding to ignore the truth in favor of political safety and expediency. The heart of the 9.4.04 60 Minutes story has never been successfully challenged by anyone.

Abundant evidence, a questionable document, accurate story, corporate cowardice — that’s what the film is about.

Defiant1

Cate Blanchett will have the rather humorous distinction of competing against herself for the Best Actress Oscar. She is a leading contender for both Truth and Carol but Academy rules state you can be only be nominated once in a category.

RichC2

Yeah, Julianne Moore ran against herself in 2003 (for Best Actress (Far from Heaven) and Best Supporting Actress (The Hours)) and won neither, they suspect she split her own vote. I can imagine that'd be a bigger problem if it were in one category.

Solid Snake

Split as in.... a voter would vote for one but maybe not for the other? And they can't vote for the same person in two acting categories? Or how does that work out?

RichC2

Apparently like to spread the wealth a little, so some would vote for her for supporting, others for lead.

Coral

And Blanchett already had the honour of competing against herself (if voters like to split votes) when she was nominated for Actress/Supporting Actress for Elizabeth: The Golden Age and I'm Not There respectively.

Not sure if the "spread the wealth" theory that can hurt double-nominees in the same year is legit though.
Of the 11 times an actor/actress was nominated for lead/supporting role in the same year, 7 of those times the actor/actress won one of the categories.

RichC2

Good point.

Decker

You can be nominated once in a single acting category.
It's a distinction that doesn't apply anywhere else in voting and led to Steven Soderbergh winning Best Director for Traffic in 2000 -- not only beating out Ridley Scott's work for Gladiator and Ang Lee's work for Crouching Tiger but also Steven Soderbergh's other film, Erin Brockovich.