Film Review: Richard Jewell
Richard Jewell is about the security guard who discovered the bomb at the opening ceremony at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. He was then named the chief suspect in the FBI's investigation and hounded by the media and the government for several months before being declared innocent. The number of so-called “trials by media” has only increased in the following decades. The proliferation of social media has only made them worse.
There’s an interesting and thought-provoking film here. Director Clint Eastwood and co-screenwriter Billy Ray have either failed to find it or neglected it entirely.
Much of the public disclosure surrounding Richard Jewell before its release centered on Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter Kathy Scruggs (Olivia Wilde) propositioning a source in order to leak that Jewell is the main suspect in the FBI’s investigation. One might think that having a reporter use sex to get a tip would be the worst thing a reporter could do in a movie.
But no. Good lord no.
Scruggs is written as a complete psychopath only focused on her own career and finding the next big story. There’s a scene where she rolls up to the crime scene and simply prays that the bomber is interesting. Her characterization is less that of an actual human being and more Saturday morning cartoon villain. She may as well have twirled a mustache whenever she was on screen.
None of these characters are written like actual people. They’re written as broad stereotypes, melodramatic vessels through which Eastwood and Ray lecture the audience on their views on the media and the government (spoilers: not rosy). Scruggs and FBI Agent Shaw (Jon Hamm) are evil and willing to do whatever it takes to slander Jewell and put him away. Jewell (Paul Walter Hauser), his mother Bobi (Kathy Bates) and his lawyer Watson Bryant (Sam Rockwell) are good Americans just trying to do what is right.
This broad characterization leaves little to no room for any counterargument against the screenwriters’ thoughts about the media and government. And there are plenty! It makes sense that the FBI would investigate someone who fit the profile of the bomber and just so happened to be the one that found the bomb. It makes sense that the local paper would report on the ongoing investigation to the best of its ability.
But the film makes Jewell’s innocence clear and unimpeachable from the get go. It saps the film of any drama and takes away the audience’s ability to consider whether or not they might have agreed with the government and the media’s handling of the investigation. That turns the film into a two-hour wait for Jewell to be declared innocent.
The wait is made to feel even longer by the fact that few of these characters are actually likable. Even Jewell, the erstwhile hero of this story, is written like a complete ass. He lets authority go to his and oversteps it in a way that endangers people, but when he’s the target of law enforcement he’s ready to let the government walk all over him.
The only characters given any sort of depth and sympathy are Watson Bryant and Bobi Jewell. Bryant is written like he knows he’s in a very bad movie. He constantly tries to stop Jewell from doing exactly as the FBI tells him and he’s not entirely successful. Bobi is a mere bystander.
What is perhaps the film’s most egregious fault, though, is that it uses this story to lecture an audience while neither Jewell nor Scruggs is alive to comment. The film makes no mention of Scruggs’ death in 2001, the role the paper had in eventually clearing Jewell’s name or the fact that the paper won a defamation case brought by Jewell and his estate “because the articles in their entirety were substantially true at the time of publication.”
Funny that.
The film isn’t technically sound either. occasionally jumps around in time with no explanation, leading to some very odd edits and shot choices. The lighting is very plain and doesn’t nearly fit the mood Eastwood is trying to set for the film.
Richard Jewell is saved by an absolutely outstanding cast. Every actor gives their all in their role and elevates what would otherwise be an absolutely unwatchable film.
Final score: 4.8/10
