Review of Suffragette (2015) by Andrew M — 05 Nov 2015

This is continuing a trend of films with good acting performances, but mediocre storytelling. It's one of those films I feel I should have liked more, as it's but honestly I found this quite uneven, so a lot of the time I was quite bored.

That may be because Mulligan's character is honestly kind of bland, and starts off the film with no fight. She gets some eventually, and that that was likely the point, to show the process by which an average woman at the time came to fight for the vote, but lacking that fire, and then seeing the melodramatic events she goes through to change feels more manipulative than an honest portrayal.

Now, I'll concede this likely happened more times than most would be comfortable with, but at least for me it didn't make for interesting viewing, as while it may have been realistic it didn't engage me.

I'd have rather seen the story of any of the other characters, such as Bonham Carter's, as whenever any of the other women were on screen it was far more interesting. Oh, and for the record, Meryl's only in the film for about 3 minutes in one scene.

Still, it's not bad, and the final act is much better, but be prepared for a bit of tedium to start.