Christine (15.)
Directed by Antonio Campos.
Starring Rebecca Hall, Michael C. Hall, Tracy Letts, Maria Dizzia, J. Smith-Cameron, Tim Simons, Kim Shaw and Timothy Simons. 119 mins.
The film of the true story of the news reporter that committee suicide live on air in 1975 is just one of a number of films of true stories (Hacksaw Ridge, Denial) out this week, but it feels only quasi true, a reality that is trying to pass itself off as an urban myth. Christine Chubbock existed, she did put a bullet to her brain during a WXLT news broadcast in Saratoga and the film has footage of Walter Cronkite reporting on it. But because the footage has disappeared, it all seems like some hazy, half truth, particularly in a culture that has starting second guessing the evidence of its own eyes.
This absence does though give her some dignity, and I think that it is a dignity Campos' film largely retains. The films lays it all out for you in a responsible and respectable manner and Hall is magnificent in the title role. If the WXLT news team is like Anchorman recast as the Addams Family she is the Morticia. She is pedantic, driven, and socially awkward, and Hall plays her with stiff little movement and abrupt shifts. Chubbock clearly suffers from clinical depression, which is exacerbated by her professional and personal frustrations, but the script gives her tale a wider resonance. It is that point in history when news is beginning to become more ratings driven and her boss (Letts) has picked up on the mantra “if it bleeds, it leads.” So her story played out against the backdrop of the Watergate hearings, becomes about the gradual cheapening of the news media. This might strike you as hijacking a personal tragedy to further an agenda but her last words, “In keeping with Channel 40’s policy of bringing you the latest in ‘blood and guts’, and in living color, you are going to see another first—attempted suicide,” validate it.
Christine is a perfectly decent film but ultimately a rather anodyne one. It does its duty, pays its respects but little else. In the previous films Campos has made with Sean Durkin (After School, Simon Killer, Martha Macey May Marlene – the pair seem to flip directing and producing duties) he looked to have the making of a distinctive film talent, one who could employ distancing techniques to startling effect. Here though the style is mainstream, straightforward; effective in its limited way but unremarkable. I like to imagine that somewhere in Hollywood there is a list of all the true stories that are due to be turned into films, that deserve the big screen treatment, even though nothing much will be gained from doing so. Well, now they can cross Christine Chubbock's off that list.
Directed by Antonio Campos.
Starring Rebecca Hall, Michael C. Hall, Tracy Letts, Maria Dizzia, J. Smith-Cameron, Tim Simons, Kim Shaw and Timothy Simons. 119 mins.
The film of the true story of the news reporter that committee suicide live on air in 1975 is just one of a number of films of true stories (Hacksaw Ridge, Denial) out this week, but it feels only quasi true, a reality that is trying to pass itself off as an urban myth. Christine Chubbock existed, she did put a bullet to her brain during a WXLT news broadcast in Saratoga and the film has footage of Walter Cronkite reporting on it. But because the footage has disappeared, it all seems like some hazy, half truth, particularly in a culture that has starting second guessing the evidence of its own eyes.
This absence does though give her some dignity, and I think that it is a dignity Campos' film largely retains. The films lays it all out for you in a responsible and respectable manner and Hall is magnificent in the title role. If the WXLT news team is like Anchorman recast as the Addams Family she is the Morticia. She is pedantic, driven, and socially awkward, and Hall plays her with stiff little movement and abrupt shifts. Chubbock clearly suffers from clinical depression, which is exacerbated by her professional and personal frustrations, but the script gives her tale a wider resonance. It is that point in history when news is beginning to become more ratings driven and her boss (Letts) has picked up on the mantra “if it bleeds, it leads.” So her story played out against the backdrop of the Watergate hearings, becomes about the gradual cheapening of the news media. This might strike you as hijacking a personal tragedy to further an agenda but her last words, “In keeping with Channel 40’s policy of bringing you the latest in ‘blood and guts’, and in living color, you are going to see another first—attempted suicide,” validate it.
Christine is a perfectly decent film but ultimately a rather anodyne one. It does its duty, pays its respects but little else. In the previous films Campos has made with Sean Durkin (After School, Simon Killer, Martha Macey May Marlene – the pair seem to flip directing and producing duties) he looked to have the making of a distinctive film talent, one who could employ distancing techniques to startling effect. Here though the style is mainstream, straightforward; effective in its limited way but unremarkable. I like to imagine that somewhere in Hollywood there is a list of all the true stories that are due to be turned into films, that deserve the big screen treatment, even though nothing much will be gained from doing so. Well, now they can cross Christine Chubbock's off that list.
