Movie Review — ‘Chappaquiddick’ Has Strong Performances But Ultimately Bores
Though popular among general audiences, history nerds, and some of the Academy, the biopic can be a tough genre to master. Veer too far away from recorded, historical facts and you’ll be smeared by the history crowd. Stick too close to the facts and you might have a serious bore on your hands. Films are, first and foremost, storytelling mediums, geared toward the dramatic and the compelling. No one wants to hear a boring story and, if we’re honest, history can be a dull list of facts rather than a harrowing adventure. The challenge for filmmakers is to balance the two and use all the tools necessary to bring to life the stories of old.
With all that said, Chappaquiddick invariably sticks close to the facts of Ted Kennedy’s biggest scandal but is unable to make them all that interesting. All of it, from the cinematography to the storytelling feels stale and rote, like they camped out in the halls of history rather than focusing on the powers of storytelling. While both Jason Clarke (Ted Kennedy) and Ed Helms (Joseph Gargan) create a few powerful performances, they’re not nearly enough to make the movie notable. Much like the scandal that briefly rocked Kennedy’s career, this film will be long forgotten within a year.
Shortly after Ted Kennedy won a senate seat, he and his team hosted a victory party at the beach on Chappaquiddick Island in Massachusetts. While driving with Mary Jo Kopechne, their car hit a small wooden bridge and drove off it into the shallow water. Kennedy survived while Kopechne was trapped inside and drowned. In the aftermath and fallout of the scandal, Kennedy struggles to follow his moral compass and cope with increasing scrutiny.
On paper, this real-life plot sounds like it might work and in deft hands, it could. However, director John Curran seems almost tone deaf to crafting a compelling drama out of it. Despite Clarke’s solid performance, it’s hard to care about Kennedy’s character or his struggles. Some nuggets are thrown in to stir empathy, such as his troubled relationship with his father and his genuine back and forth moral battle waging within.
While his inner turmoil is well told and complex, showing a man waffling between covering up the scandal to laying out a full page confession, nothing lands or defines the character by the end. Do we have a villain? A hero? A complex politician with a morally problematic character? By the end, you’re not really going to care and it won’t come across as profound.
The cinematography is similar in style to Fincher’s work with Jeff Cronenweth. Cold, sterile, and focusing on simplicity and wide-angle shots, but, unlike them, the work here regularly lacks substance or flare. The best moment is when Kennedy has a discussion with a team of lawyers. Curran focuses solely on two shots, one where Kennedy is alone on a couch and the other on a team of lawyers facing him down. They painted this well, showing Kennedy’s isolation against overwhelming odds. However, outside of that, the washed out brown color palette and the dull shots only worked against it.
While Kennedy struggles with his moral character, the filmmakers struggle with the film’s tone. For its part, most of the movie tries to present a even-keeled portrait of a slice of political history. While dramatic moments are few and far between, for some reason they decide to throw in a few untimely wisecracks during dire periods. Not only is it not funny and inappropriate, but it greatly damages the tone of the movie (Quite often, I wondered if what I was watching was a comedy movie in a drama movie’s clothing).
The relationship between Kennedy and Gargan is a tragic missed opportunity to heighten the narrative. As stated earlier, Clarke and Helms do a great job together but their performances aren’t enough to take this to the next level. Too often, Gargan devolves into a Jiminy Cricket-esque character, acting as the stalwart moral check to Kennedy’s worst impulses, but doesn’t become anything more. Due to this, it’s hard to care when the scandal impacts their relationship. The fallout should have some weight but it doesn’t.
The filmmakers of Chappaquiddick try to craft together an Oscar contender but fail to captivate at any point in the story. Only the performances truly stand out but they, sadly, aren’t enough. What we’re left with is a boring biopic that doesn’t bring much else to the table. You’re welcome to traverse through this piece in history but by the end, it’s doubtful you’ll get much out of it.
Rating: 5/10
Photos courtesy of: Apex Entertainment.
