MOVIE REVIEWS
Hollywoodland
Eric Yang
Who better to portray misguided stardom than Ben Affleck? For awhile, his career seemed to be snowballing into imminent doom. In Hollywoodland, Affleck, with his familiar wise-guy smirk and cocky intellectual charm, embodies “Superman” George Reeves and his deluded Hollywood dream. Reeves is impassioned yet frustrated, burdened by the very romanticism that drives him. He seems blinded by an invisible Kryptonic force; every step he takes is a step towards inconsolable despair. Fame is his friend and his enemy. If Reeves were alive today, he probably would have been found mentoring the Good Will Hunting co-star during his Gigli period. Affleck, no doubt, used his own experience with failure to breathe life into his performance.
Directed by TV veteran Allen Coulter (The Sopranos, Sex and the City), Hollywoodland is a perceptive film noir, one that engages its audience with complex, nuanced characters. The mystery is whether or not Reeves really did kill himself, and as the protagonist, Private Detective Louis Simo (Adrien Brody), investigates the possibility of a murder, the film becomes a compelling examination of jealousy and immorality. Each of the characters fall prey to their own vices, most prominently Toni Mannix (Diane Lane), the wife of MGM exec Eddie Mannix (Bob Hoskins), whose love for Reeves gradually becomes a painful, festering wound.
The movie isn’t so much a biopic as it is a fictional entertainment based on biographical details. But that’s precisely why it works. Coulter and his screenwriter, Paul Bernbaum, are wise enough to play up the whodunit element of the story, because, let’s face it, no one was asking for the consummate George Reeves biopic. This is Brody’s movie; it’s his fictitious detective who propels the narrative and keeps us perfectly discombobulated with each new development.
I think it would be premature to call this Ben Affleck’s comeback, but it’s certainly his most memorable performance since 1997’s Chasing Amy. At 34, the actor is still as boyishly charismatic as he was ten years ago. In Hollywoodland, if he doesn’t always disappear into his role, that’s probably because Reeves’ plunge into B-moviedom reminds us of Affleck’s own embarrassing career missteps (i.e. Surviving Christmas). But when he’s on-screen with the gracefulness of Diane Lane, we can feel the movie-star gravity that helped him ascend to fame in the first place.
Hollywoodland is also bolstered by its depiction of Tinseltown as seedy and corrupt. It’s the villain of the movie. Hoskins injects a ruthlessness in Mannix that could rival Don Vito Corleone. His publicist follows orders like a vicious henchman. The only person who seems to represent any good is Reeves’ agent. It’s no wonder why Reeves was sucked into a downward spiral. Ultimately, the film leaves us with more questions than answers. Reeves’ death will always remain an enigma. There is, however, one thing we’re sure of by the end: being a celebrity is a killer job.
