Review of Hollywoodland (2006) by Barbara W — 30 Dec 2012

The directorial debut of Allen Coulter (Remember Me (2010), and written by Paul Bernbaum (Next (2007)), this is a biographical drama that showed the mysterious death of TV's biggest superstar of the 1950's, and whether it could have been foul-play or something else.

It's an interesting mystery, and it was a slight comeback of sorts for one of it's lead actors, whose career had gone into a slump at the time. In Hollywood in 1959, private investigator Louis Simo (Adrien Brody) while investigating one case, comes across a theory or two regarding the death of actor George Reeves (Ben Affleck), who was famous for playing Superman on TV.

While the police say Reeves committed suicide by gunshot, Simo discovers that the witness testimonies don't match up, and there are irregularities in how it could have happened. Simo investigates further, and it discovers that Reeves was having an affair with Toni Mannix (Diane Lane), whose husband Eddie Mannix (Bob Hoskins) is the head of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Simo suspects foul-play, but he can't prove it.

It's an interesting theory as to how TV's first superstar might have died, but it's all a big conspiracy theory. The biggest surprise is Affleck playing Reeves as a snobbish cad, it shows that with the right material, Affleck can turn in a brilliant performance.