Rating of
2/4
Writers Blocked
Unknown - wrote on 12/10/15
'Trumbo' is not the behind-the-scenes of Hollywood biography I was hoping for. The film tackles a major issue in the film industries past by repeatedly telling us how it was a wrong injustice. I agree, but I'd rather have been told something new. The time period is represented well. You get a sense of every different point-of-view on the whole Hollywood Blacklist debacle. It does a good job of informing us of how things went down. In doing so, there's a lack of dramatic investment. More time is spent on hammering home the obvious politics and not enough on character and story. I never sided with anyone outside of Trumbo, and that's only because he's the main character and Cranston's performance is great. Everyone else is just playing "dress up" as someone involved with moviemaking from the time period. Half of them are completely famous individuals, but I didn't recognize who they were supposed to be because the actors don't look/sound anything like those being portrayed. The repetition and lack of involvement made it feel overlong. There's an attempt at showing the social injustices that occurred. They just don't hold much thematic weight in this context. The scenes examining Trumbo's work habits during this stressful time are the only highlights.
