Review of Trumbo (2015) by Alice S — 14 Feb 2016

Bryan Cranston is just such a very good actor. He utilizes his entire being - voice, eyes, mouth, shoulders, gut, hands, feet - to create a multifaceted performance. "Trumbo" is the maddening story about the unconstitutional witch hunt of suspected communists and communist sympathizers during the Red Scare. Hollywood ghostwriter of "Roman Holiday" Dalton Trumbo and friends face persecution, job loss, imprisonment, prejudice, and harassment for committing the crime of taking the 1st Amendment literally.

The script hits all the intellectual and emotional highs and lows (though sometimes a bit too abstrusely), and the historical context surrounding the blacklist (post-WWII and pre-civil rights movement) are nicely evinced. The splicing together of modern actors into grainy black and white footage is also very cool. The performances are all strong, especially Cranston and Michael Stuhlbarg (whom I could not place for the life of me, but now realize, played the titular serious man in one of the first Coen Brothers' movies I ever liked) as the stocky, noir antihero in life and art, Edward G. Robinson.

A recurring continuity error that really grinded my gears though was the awkward aging, namely the random and sudden swapping in of giantess Elle Fanning as middle daughter Nikola (great name, though) while the babyfaced eldest brother looks exactly the same. Then later when the eldest brother is portrayed by an older actor while Elle Fanning looks exactly the same. Then Alan Tudyk and Diane Lane looking exactly the same thirty years later, though let's be honest, Lane will never age. And of course, Elle Fanning in a brassy red, Jackie O-style blowout reminiscent of the horrible age make-up job for Bonnie Wright as thirty-five-year-old Ginny Weasley. Why, future? Why?