Review of Richard Jewell (2019) by Jordanlayton — 27 Apr 2020

A great story I was unaware of with some good performances, questionable editing, and an amateur screenplay. This story of a true believer in the the United States justice system being shown its darkest side is a compelling one. The way it's told is from a very one-sided point of view, but I don't have too much trouble believing that there was little exaggeration in the details that mattered about it.

Walter Hauser gives an impressive performance in a role that is arguably quite difficult to empathize with and Kathy Bates came to her supporting role in a lane I didn't know she had: a tired, withering, mother. If there's one thing this film has, it's great performances in difficult roles. Playing a smart character with strong convictions is one thing, but getting an audience to empathize with less educated characters with strong convictions is a difficult task, in my experience. Unfortunately, some other things went wrong. Some films are saved in the edit. I would argue this one was partially lost in it. One buzz phrase in film making is "arrive late, leave early:' This film unfortunately did the opposite and you feel it. This may have also been a screenplay issue, of which there were many. Copious flashbacks and one cliche dream sequence are written into this script and it just did not need those things on top of the other fluff that dragged this film out to 2h12m. This story definitely did not require that runtime to tell. For those reasons, I'm out.