By early October 2016, Woody Harrelson, James Marsden, Tommy Lee Jones, Jessica Biel, Milla Jovovich, Richard Schiff, and Reiner were cast in a political drama to be directed by Reiner and written by Hartstone, marking their second collaboration after LBJ (2016). At the same time, principal photography commenced, and took place in Louisiana and Washington, D.C.
The film stars Harrelson, Marsden, Reiner, Jones, Biel, Jovovich, and Schiff. The cast delivered powerhouse performances in this straightforward, solid political drama. The best thing the director has going for him is his cast. Reiner has enough spice to keep the viewer alert and attentive with this cast. The cast captures dogged, hardworking approach to politics. They inject pace, energy and colour into a familiar storytelling approach that flicks back and forth across the period. Harrelson and Marsden gave it all they had as the gruff, emotionally needy and politically savvy reporters. It's well-calibrated performances, with Harrelson and Marsden convincingly conveying how Landay and Strobel felt the weight of the world on their shoulders and took on that challenge in mostly admirable ways.
Here the physical and the verbal prevail over the analytic. This ends up placing the film in the category of conventional biopic. There's nothing in the film, and certainly nothing in the scene in question, that conveys anything but the most blasé of platitudes. When the film isn't cracking jokes the film explores Landay and Strobel's desire to inform the public and fears of rejection but doesn't go far enough to ensure compelling results. The film is a consistently compelling history lesson, which puts the spotlight on two men who are forced to navigate the country through one of the most pivotal periods of the last century. There is a richer film here than the generically-told one that Reiner gives us, despite Harrelson's plucky firebrand of a performance. The film isn't a satire like Oliver Stone's serious lampoon of a political scion. It's something less - and weirder. This third-rate but expedient film regrets the decency we've lost and that Reiner is nostalgic for. The film is too conventional and too scattered to add anything of substance or interest to the story. A great, award-worthy performance and some decent dialogue in an otherwise truncated feeling movie. The film captures a tumultuous political era and one of its most profanely colorful leaders with a good deal of insight and emotional torque. Here, Reiner's more like an efficient ride operator, unconcerned about the clankiness of the machinery but certain you'll enjoy the stuff that's supposed to work. Reiner's film fails to do justice to both the men and the fraught times he so fundamentally influenced. A fairly standard-issue political docu-drama that's likely to hold your interest without being especially enlightening or vivid.
Simon says Shock and Awe receives:
Also, see my review for LBJ.
Here the physical and the verbal prevail over the analytic. This ends up placing the film in the category of conventional biopic. There's nothing in the film, and certainly nothing in the scene in question, that conveys anything but the most blasé of platitudes. When the film isn't cracking jokes the film explores Landay and Strobel's desire to inform the public and fears of rejection but doesn't go far enough to ensure compelling results. The film is a consistently compelling history lesson, which puts the spotlight on two men who are forced to navigate the country through one of the most pivotal periods of the last century. There is a richer film here than the generically-told one that Reiner gives us, despite Harrelson's plucky firebrand of a performance. The film isn't a satire like Oliver Stone's serious lampoon of a political scion. It's something less - and weirder. This third-rate but expedient film regrets the decency we've lost and that Reiner is nostalgic for. The film is too conventional and too scattered to add anything of substance or interest to the story. A great, award-worthy performance and some decent dialogue in an otherwise truncated feeling movie. The film captures a tumultuous political era and one of its most profanely colorful leaders with a good deal of insight and emotional torque. Here, Reiner's more like an efficient ride operator, unconcerned about the clankiness of the machinery but certain you'll enjoy the stuff that's supposed to work. Reiner's film fails to do justice to both the men and the fraught times he so fundamentally influenced. A fairly standard-issue political docu-drama that's likely to hold your interest without being especially enlightening or vivid.
Simon says Shock and Awe receives:
Also, see my review for LBJ.
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