Samantha Morton Archives

Review: ‘2073,’ starring Samantha Morton

December 27, 2024

by Carla Hay

“2073”

Directed by Asif Kapadia

Culture Representation: Taking place in 2073 in the fictional U.S. city called New San Francisco, the docudrama film “2073” features a racially diverse group of people (white, black, Latin, Asian and Indigenous) who portray apocalypse survivors (in the drama scenes) or who are real-life political activists.

Culture Clash: The politically liberal activists who make comments for the documentary predict that an apocalypse will happen in the 21st century due to environmental, socioeconomic and political issues.

Culture Audience: “2073” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of director Asif Kapadia and “end of the world” movies that place almost all the blame on politically conservative people.

A scene from “2073” of the Golden Gate Bridge in California affected by wildfires (Photo courtesy of Neon)

Pretentious and derivative, “2073” is a doomsday docudrama that combines dreary apocalypse scenes with left-wing political lecturing. There’s too much whining and not enough talk about practical solutions. The “end of the world” warnings in this movie just add up to a lot of annoying hot air. The so-called experts interviewed for this movie just want to blame the world’s problems on people who don’t share their liberal political beliefs.

Directed by Asif Kapadia, “2073” had its world premiere at the 2024 Venice International Film Festival. The movie made the rounds at several other film festivals in 2024, including the BFI London Film Festival and DOC NYC. Kapadia won an Oscar for the 2015 Amy Winehouse documentary “Amy.” Unfortunately, “2073” is a low point in his filmmography.

Although “2073” is undoubtedly a film that has noble intentions, it has a heavy-handed approach. The movie has an obvious political agenda, but that agenda’s credibility is lowered with the movie using fictional, scripted scenes as examples of the gloom and doom predicted in the movie. Kapadia and Tony Grisoni co-wrote the “2073” screenplay.

The concept of “2073” isn’t very original. According to the movie’s synopsis, “2073” is inspired by Chris Marker’s “iconic 1962 featurette ‘La Jetée,’ about a time traveler who risks his life to change the course of history and save the future of humanity.” As explained in the beginning of “2073,” the scripted portions of the movie take place in 2073—37 years after “the event,” which obviously means an apocalypse. In other words, this apocalypse happened in 2036, which is just 12 years after the release of this movie.

The scripted drama scenes in “2073” are in a fictional city called New San Francisco, which is described as the capital of the Americas. In this bombed-out city, there’s an electronic billboard showing news reports about Chairwoman Ivanka Trump. What entity has Ivanka Trump as a chairwoman? Don’t expect this ridiculous movie to answer that question. The “2073” filmmakers’ obvious intention is to provoke viewers who would get upset at the thought of Ivanka Trump being chairwoman of anything.

The movie’s drama scenes follows the depressing and solitary life of an apocalypse survivor (played by Samantha Morton), whose name is listed in the end credits as Ghost. Ghost, who is a voiceover narrator for these drama scenes, is seen living in a dark and destroyed building while avoiding being seen by other people as much as possible. According to Ghost, her memory was “slipping through [her] fingers, like sand.”

Ghost also says she’s in hiding because one day “they” came for her. “I ran. I’m still running. My life is turning into one of those sci-fi comics I used to read. There are others here—survivors, renegades.” Other scenes in the movie show that the Americas—or at least New San Francisco—is being run by an oppressive government that rounds up “renegades” and tortures them.

Ghost is trying to avoid detection from an artificial intelligence being called Jack. “He listens and watches everything,” Ghost says about Jack. “You can’t trust anyone anymore. People thought the world would end, but the world goes on. It’s us who’ll end.”

It’s all so tedious to watch this watered-down ripoff of Big Brother from George Orwell’s doomsday “1984” novel, which was published in 1949 and predicted a dystopian future. In “2073,” Naomi Ackie has a small and ultimately inconsequential role as a professor character. Morton’s acting as Ghost is adequate by can’t overcome the weak screenplay.

As for the “talking heads” interviews in the documentary sections of “2073,” these comments are presented as voiceovers, presumably not to distract from the movie’s dramatic images of Ghost suffering in a decrepit place where food and water are scarce. In the documentary parts of the movie, the people commenting are politically liberal activists from Europe, North America, and Asia. The documentary doesn’t explain why, in a movie about the “end of the world,” there is no commentator representation from other largely populated continents, such as Africa and Australia.

Almost all of the activist commentators are also journalists and/or writers, such as Maria Ressa, Carole Cadwalladr, Rana Ayyub Ben Rhodes, Rahima Mahmut, Silkie Carlo, Cori Crider, George Monbiot, Nina Schick, Douglas Rushkof, Carmody Grey, James O’Brien, Anne Applebaum and Antony Lowenstein. The other commentators are Amazon Labor Union founder Chris Smalls, computer scientist Tristan Harris and environmental activist Alessandra Korap.

The problem with “2073” is that the documentary parts of the movie are just soundbite compilations that recycle whatever rants these people have already said or written in other movies or media reports. Want to know about Ressa’s crusade for freedom of the press in her native Philippines? There was already an excellent documentary about it: 2020’s “A Thousand Cuts,” directed by Ramona S. Díaz. Labor union leader Smalls is the star of the 2024 documentary “Union,” (directed by Stephen Maing and Brett Story), which chronicles Amazon Labor Union becoming the first union at corporate giant Amazon.

The “2073” doomsday warnings about the environment are very “been there, done that” and were already well-presented by Al Gore in the Oscar-winning 2006 documentary “An Inconvenient Truth” (directed by Davis Guggenheim), as well as in many other documentaries and news reports about climate change. And that why it’s so boring and basic to hear political strategist/security expert Sherri Goodman say in “2073” commentary: “We are truly in a climate emergency.”

Other concerns brought forth in the documentary parts of “2073” have to do with government surveillance, civil rights and the erosion of democracy. The essential messaging of “2073” is that (1) anyone who’s involved in conservative politics is contributing to the end of the world; (2) only progressive political liberals are smart enough to tell you that; and (3) if you don’t believe the commentators in the movie, then you must be an idiot. It’s a very condescending tone that can be an absolute turn-off to people (even liberals) who are open-minded and intelligent enough to make up their own minds about how they feel about world issues.

It’s appalling that so many journalists are interviewed for “2073” but their comments in the movie are not really about investigative journalism but are just soundbite rants that say nothing new. By not presenting anything substantial to prove that opposing viewpoints are wrong, “2073” fails at being balanced and is actually quite didactic in its “political liberals are always right” messaging. For a more informative look at the world’s problems and effective ways to deal with these problems, progressive liberals can watch MSNBC or read Mother Jones and don’t need to watch “2073,” a misguided movie that is unrelenting in its paranoia and political divisiveness that don’t give any logical and hopeful solutions.

Neon released “2073” in select U.S. cinemas on December 27, 2024.

Review: ‘The Whale’ (2022), starring Brendan Fraser

December 8, 2022

by Carla Hay

Brendan Fraser in “The Whale” (Photo courtesy of A24)

“The Whale” (2022)

Directed by Darren Aronofksy

Culture Representation: Taking place over five days in July 2016, in an unnamed city in Idaho, the dramatic film “The Whale” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with two people of Asian heritage) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A very obese man, who lives as a shut-in and refuses to get hospital treatment for his failing health, spends time trying to reconnect with his estranged teenage daughter, while he also has tension-filled encounters with his visiting friend/nurse, his ex-wife and a young Christian missionary.

Culture Audience: “The Whale” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of star Brendan Fraser; director Darren Aronofsky; the Samuel L. Hunter play on which the movie is based; and emotionally intense dramas about society misfits and the need for love, acceptance and forgiveness.

Sadie Sink in “The Whale” (Photo by Niko Tavernise/A24)

“The Whale” has impactful performances that get viewers to react on a visceral level. People will think about what makes them uncomfortable in this story, which takes an emotional journey into the type of life that some people think should be hidden. With only a few exceptions, the scenes in “The Whale” take place inside the dark and depressing two-bedroom apartment of the movie’s protagonist: a very obese shut-in named Charlie (played by Brendan Fraser, in a stunning performance), who knows he is dying but refuses to go to a hospital because he doesn’t have the health insurance to cover any expenses. Aside from his physical issues, what’s really ailing Charlie is that he’s guilt-ridden and heartbroken over what has happened in his life.

Darren Aronofsky directed “The Whale,” which is based on Samuel L. Hunter’s “The Whale” play that was originally staged in 2013. Hunter, whose own life experiences inspired “The Whale,” also wrote the adapted screenplay for “The Whale.” The movie takes place in an unnamed Idaho city, over five days (Monday through Friday) in July 2016. (“The Whale” was actually filmed in Newburgh, New York.) Viewers know that it’s July 2016, because when Charlie briefly turns on his TV, there are live news reports about the 2016 Republican National Convention.

During the movie’s opening credits, a travel bus is seen dropping off a teenage male passenger on a nearly deserted expressway. Charlie will soon meet this stranger under some very stressful circumstances. This stranger becomes briefly involved in Charlie’s life in an unexpected way.

Charlie makes a living as an English teacher of students enrolled in an online course. He currently has 14 students, who all do group video conference calls with him for the class sessions. Because Charlie is self-conscious about his physical appearance, he doesn’t want the students to know what he looks like, so he tells a lie by saying that his computer’s videocamera isn’t working.

Charlie’s assignments for the students consist mostly of writing essays. He has high standards and places a lot of emphasis on his students writing essays that are authentic to who they are as individuals. During a session shown early in the movie, Charlie tells his students, “The point of this course to learn how to write clearly and persuasively. That’s how you effectively communicate your ideas.”

Charlie’s weight is so massive, he has trouble breathing and he usually can’t move while upright unless he’s using a walker or a wheelchair. The details of Charlie’s shut-in life are eventually revealed in conversations, but the gist of it is that he began overeating out of grief because his live-in boyfriend Alan Grant committed suicide. Nine years ago, Charlie left his ex-wife Mary (played by Samantha Morton) to be with Alan, who was a former student of Charlie’s in an adult education class. Alan and Charlie met because of this class.

Charlie and Mary have a rebellious 17-year-old daughter named Ellie (played by Sadie Sink), who is very resentful of Charlie because he’s had no contact with her for the past nine years. Mary has had full custody of Ellie since Charlie left them. Charlie has paid child support, but Mary has refused to let Charlie contact Ellie for all of these years, and he eventually gave up. Charlie only hears about Ellie when he calls Mary about once a month to check in with Mary and ask how Ellie is doing. Mary has now become a bitter alcoholic, and it’s implied that she’s also addicted to Xanax.

Charlie’s existence is very lonely. His one true friend is a nurse named Liz (played by Hong Chau), who also happens to be the adopted sister of Alan. Liz and Alan grew up in a conservative Christian household, and their father is a high-ranking leader of a church called New Life. The church isn’t exactly a full-blown cult, but it’s very controlling and judgmental about how the church members (and non-members) lead their lives.

New Life also has missionaries who try to get people to join the church. Needless to say, New Life condemns any sexuality that isn’t heterosexual. Liz and Charlie want nothing to do with the church, because they think that the church, especially Alan’s father, caused a lot of emotional damage to Alan, who had a history of depression. In case it isn’t clear enough, Liz says early on the movie, “I fucking hate New Life.”

The only other person who’s in regular contact with Charlie is a pizza delivery guy named Dan (played by Sathya Sridharan), who has to leave the pizza and pick up Charlie’s payment outside Charlie’s front door, because Charlie doesn’t want Dan to know what Charlie looks like. It’s a painful reminder to Charlie of how low his self-esteem has gotten that he’s ashamed to interact with strangers on a face-to-face basis. Dan delivers pizza to the Charlie’s apartment several times during the movie.

In one of the first scenes in “The Whale,” Charlie is home alone and masturbating while watching gay porn on his laptop computer. (There’s no nudity in this movie.) He suddenly starts wheezing and calls out for help. A young man who happened to be outside Charlie’s apartment suddenly bursts in the unlocked door, because he heard Charlie’s cries of distress. The young man, who’s in his late teens, is named Thomas (played by Ty Simpkins), and he’s the same guy who was dropped off by the travel bus.

Thomas says he’ll call for an ambulance, but Charlie orders him not to do that, because Charlie insists that he doesn’t need to go to a hospital and because he has a nurse friend who can come over to help. Until Liz can get there, Charlie has a very unusual request: He hands Thomas a written essay about Herman Melville’s 1851 novel “Moby Dick” and tells Thomas to read the essay to him. Hearing the essay seems to calm Charlie down considerably.

Charlie calls Liz, who comes over to give Charlie the medical attention that she can give to him. His blood pressure reading is an alarming 238/134. She tells Charlie in no uncertain terms that if he doesn’t go to a hospital for help, he will die. Charlie still refuses hospital treatment and says he doesn’t want to be in debt over hospital bills. Liz quips, “It’s better to be in debt than dead.”

After Liz arrives, Thomas introduces himself as a missionary from New Church. As soon as Liz hears that information, she’s immediately hostile and mistrustful of Thomas. She lets him know how she disliked being in the New Church community as a child. Liz also tells Thomas that there’s no point in trying to convert Charlie either. Thomas listens to Liz’s rant, but he still thinks he can somehow “save” an obviously troubled Charlie through religious counseling.

Liz, Thomas, Mary and Ellie visit Charlie over the course of the movie in several emotionally charged scenes. Ellie shows up suddenly at the apartment one day to demand that Charlie write an essay for her. He’s surprised to hear that she’s flunking out of school, and Ellie tells him that needs a good grade on this essay, or else she’ll be expelled. Mary, who shows up later to look for Ellie, is in a simmering rage because she doesn’t want Ellie to be in contact with Charlie.

During the course of the story, secrets are revealed, tensions run high, and Charlie tries to make up for lost time with Ellie. She doesn’t make it easy for Charlie, because she berates and insults him for a great deal of their time together. Mary’s relationship with Ellie has deteriorated to the point that Mary tells Charlie that she thinks Ellie is “evil.” Not only is Ellie a troublemaker at school, but she’s also a cyberbully who cruelly taunts and harasses people online if she decides that she doesn’t like them.

Even in his dismal state, Charlie is an optimist who wants to see the good in people, and he refuses to believe that Ellie is a bad person. He thinks Ellie is lashing out because of the emotional damage that was caused when he left Ellie and Mary. As Charlie also says in the movie, he desperately wants to believe that Ellie is the one thing in his life that he got right.

Charlie repeatedly compliments Ellie in an attempt to make her (and himself) feel better, but Ellie usually reacts with more anger and resentment. How much longer does Charlie has to live? All he knows is that he doesn’t want to die without making peace with Ellie.

“The Whale” had its world premiere at the 2022 Venice International Film Festival, and then made the rounds at several other film festivals in 2022, including the Toronto International Film Festival and the BFI London Film Festival. It’s the type of movie that will have the most appeal to people who don’t mind watching films that essentially take place in one location. In this case, the location is an apartment that the cast members succeed in making seem like a claustrophobic, ticking time bomb of emotions that’s ready to explode at any moment.

Fraser gives a heart-wrenching performance as someone on the verge of dying who is engulfed in regret, guilt and shame about how his life turned out, but who’s desperately seeking love and forgiveness from the daughter he abandoned. Fraser’s use of his eyes and facial expressions are a master class in expressing this despair of isolation, as well as the frustration of someone whose physical size often renders him immobile. (For Charlie’s body, Fraser wore prosthetics from his neck down.)

Morton and Sink also give striking performances as embittered Mary and Ellie, who don’t like each other very much, probably because they’re so similar to each other, and their worst qualities remind them of what they don’t like about themselves. The cracks in the hard emotional shells of Mary and Ellie sometimes show, with Ellie having some indications (no matter how hostile they are) that she still wants Charlie’s love. Mary also has a moment in the movie where she expresses her vulnerability with Charlie.

Chau’s performance as Jenny is an admirably nuanced balancing act that shows Jenny’s frustration and confusion over how to be a nurse and a friend to Charlie. Jenny gives medical attention to Charlie, scolds him about not taking care of himself, and even saves him from choking on a hoagie. But she’s also someone who buys junk food for Charlie because she knows that’s what makes him superficially happy, even though she knows that giving him fattening food is a medically irresponsible thing to do.

Simpkins does well in his role, but Thomas is a stranger to Charlie. The women in Charlie’s life mean much more to Charlie and to this story. And the movie doesn’t gloss over how much food means to Charlie. He feeds his food addiction as if food can fill up the emptiness that he feels within himself. There are a few food-binging scenes when Charlie is alone that will make some viewers squirm in discomfort.

If there’s one main criticism that some people might have about “The Whale,” it’s that the movie at times seems to be trying too hard to wring emotions out of the audience. There are moments that come across as a “play to the back of the room” vibe of a stage production, where theater actors tend to go very big with their dramatic deliveries of the dialogue. Rob Simonsen’s musical score for “The Whale” is the very definition of tearjerker music. It’s perfectly effective, but some viewers might not like how everything is staged in the movie.

Some viewers will also be turned off by how the story is confined to one apartment where people argue and are sometimes awful to each other. But that’s the whole point: Charlie is “stuck” in more ways than one. And “The Whale,” like it or not, makes viewers feel what Charlie is feeling in this very confined space where he’s “stuck” and has to confront some very ugly and raw emotions. The movie also asks viewers to think about people like Charlie who are “stuck” and hide themselves away from a world that they think doesn’t want them anymore.

Many people could assume that the title of “The Whale” has to do with being a derogatory term about Charlie’s appearance. But the beauty of this story, which the filmmakers and cast members express so wonderfully, is that the title of “The Whale” is really about Charlie’s connection to that “Moby Dick” essay. It’s a connection about honesty and compassion that transcends anyone’s physical appearance.

A24 will release “The Whale” in select U.S. cinemas on December 9, 2022.

Review: ‘She Said,’ starring Carey Mulligan, Zoe Kazan, Patricia Clarkson, Andre Braugher, Jennifer Ehle, Samantha Morton and Ashley Judd

October 13, 2022

by Carla Hay

“She Said”

Directed by Maria Schrader

Culture Representation: Taking place mostly in 2016 and 2017, primarily in New York City (and briefly in California, the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Italy), the dramatic film “She Said” (based on real events) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans and Asians) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: New York Times reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey investigate sexual abuse allegations against entertainment mogul Harvey Weinstein and help usher in a new era in the #MeToo movement.

Culture Audience: “She Said” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching well-acted historical dramas about investigative journalism and seeking justice for crimes.

Wesley Holloway, Jennifer Ehle and Justine Colan in “She Said” (Photo by JoJo Whilden/Universal Pictures)

With the tone and pace of a procedural crime drama, “She Said” uncovers nothing new about The New York Times’ 2017 report that helped spur the downfall of Harvey Weinstein, who went from being a powerful mogul in the entertainment industry to becoming an imprisoned, convicted rapist. However, the movie’s top-notch cast members (including a terrific Samantha Morton in a standout supporting role) deliver better-than-average performances in this important story that needs to be told. It’s a very female-driven movie that puts the narrative where it belongs: on Weinstein’s abuse survivors who had the courage to speak to The New York Times for this groundbreaking report, as well as the two women who investigated and wrote this report.

Directed by Maria Schrader and written by Rebecca Lenkiewicz, “She Said” is adapted from the 2019 non-fiction book “She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement,” written by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, the two New York Times reporters who investigated and wrote the report that exposed accusations against Weinstein for crimes and misdeeds against women, spanning several decades as far back as the 1980s. The report, which was published in October 2017, included detailed accounts of sexual harassment and/or sexual assault alleged by a variety of women, including some of Weinstein’s former employees, famous actresses (such as Gwyneth Paltrow and Ashley Judd) and various other colleagues. “She Said” had its world premiere at the 2022 New York Film Festival in New York City.

“She Said” opens with a flashback to 1992. In this scene, a 21-year-old female production assistant is on a film set in Ireland. She comes across as an eager and friendly employee who’s happy to be at her job and enjoys being around her co-workers. The movie then abruptly shifts to showing her running in fear on a city street, as if she’s just experienced something terrifying.

It’s at this point you know that this woman has become one of Weinstein’s sexual abuse victims. In 1992, Weinstein (who co-founded Miramax Films and later The Weinstein Company) was on the rise in the industry as a movie producer and studio chief. He would eventually win an Academy Award for Best Picture, for 1998’s “Shakespeare in Love.”

Later on in “She Said,” which takes place mostly in 2016 and 2017, viewers find out that this frightened young woman’s name is Zelda Perkins. And 25 years after her horrifying experience with Weinstein left her with deep trauma and disillusionment about the entertainment industry, Zelda (played by Morton) is ready to tell her story to The New York Times. It’s by far the best scene in the movie. She declares, “This is bigger than Weinstein. This is about the system protecting abusers.”

“She Said” goes step-by-step in showing how Jodi Kantor (played by Zoe Kazan) and Megan Twohey (played by Carey Mulligan) ended up working together on this landmark investigation which helped bring a surge to the #MeToo movement and garnered a Pulitzer Prize for Kantor and Twohey. (For the purpose of this review, the movie characters will be referred to by their first names, while the real-life people will be referred to by their last names.) Someone who is briefly mentioned (but never shown) in the movie is investigative journalist Ronan Farrow, who also won a Pultizer Prize for his own Weinstein exposé that The New Yorker published a day after The New York Times’ report. “She Said” portrays Farrow’s report as something that Jodi and Megan were aware was happening simultaneously, but Farrow’s competing report did not distract Jodi and Megan from their own investigation.

Jodi’s and Megan’s respective personal lives are shown tangentially for context reasons, in order to give viewers an idea of how this investigation affected their lives outside of their jobs. Jodi and Megan both have loving, supportive husbands (Jodi’s journalist husband Ron Lieber is played by Adam Shapiro; Megan’s literary-agent husband Vadim “Jim” Rutman is played by Tom Pelphrey), but the women are at different stages in their lives when it comes to motherhood.

At the beginning of the investigation, Jodi had two daughters under the age of 12, while Megan was a mother of a newborn child. (Elle Graham has the role of Jodi and Ron’s older daughter Gracie, while Maren Heary has the role of younger daughter Nell.) Their struggles with post-partum depression are mentioned in the movie when Megan confides in Jodi about having post-partum depression, and Jodi reveals that she had this type of depression too.

“She Said” also shows that while Jodi was enthusiastic about pursuing the investigation from the beginning, Megan was more skeptical and reluctant, because many of their sources refused to go on the record, usually because they signed non-disclosure agreements with Weinstein in exchange for a monetary settlement, and/or the accusers feared retaliation. The movie takes on sinister qualities when it shows that Megan and Jodi (and some of their sources) were stalked and threatened by unidentified men who were believed to have been hired by Weinstein.

Slowly but surely, through in-person visits to interview many of the survivors in person, Jodi and Megan begin to get a growing number of women who were willing to go on the record. Judd portrays herself in the scenes where she interacts with Megan and Jodi. In real life and in the movie, Judd tells her story about how Weinstein had her blackballed from getting jobs after she rejected his sexual advances.

Two other key witnesses come forward to help with the investigation: former Weinstein employees Rowena Chiu (played by Angela Yeoh) and Laura Madden (played by Jennifer Ehle), a mother of two underage children, who was also dealing with the recent news that she would have to get a mastectomy due to her breast cancer. (Justine Colan has the role of Laura’s daughter Iris, while Wesley Holloway has the role of Laura’s son Hywel.) Yeoh and Ehle both make an impact with their admirable performances.

Jodi, the more emotionally sensitive reporter of the duo, is described by Megan at one point in the movie as “less intimidating” than Megan because Jodi is shorter and looks more approachable. There’s a well-performed scene where Jodi makes a big mistake in revealing some information to Rowena’s husband that could derail a possible interview with Rowena. Jodi is distraught by this mistake, in a powerful scene that shows the human fallibility that can happen in investigative journalism.

Megan considers herself to be a more seasoned and more jaded reporter than Jodi. Megan doesn’t like to show emotional vulnerability, but she goes through more of an emotional rollercoaster due to her post-partum depression, which she tries to hide from her colleagues, in order not to be perceived as “weak” or “incompetent.” It’s an issue that many mothers in the workforce go through in real life, and it’s handled with tasteful respect in “She Said,” with Mulligan giving a nuanced performance.

The movie also depicts some of the rejections that Jodi and Megan received from potential sources who ultimately were too afraid or uninterested in going on the record with The New York Times. And the movie also depicts some of Weinstein’s enablers, including attorney Lisa Bloom (played by Anastasia Barzee), who tarnished her feminist image when she was hired to be a paid consultant to do damage control for Weinstein. Bloom also had a book deal with Weinstein. John Schmidt (played John Mazurek), who worked for Weinstein as a chief financial officer, and attorney Lanny Davis (played by Peter Friedman), who used to be one of Weinstein’s consultants, are shown having guilt-ridden reckonings when they are confronted by Megan and Jodi about their active participation in covering up Weinstein’s abuses.

The New York Times is portrayed as approaching this story meticulously, with supportive editors who demanded a high level of accountability and evidence before publishing the report. Patricia Clarkson has a generic role as New York Times assistant managing editor Rebecca Corbett. Andre Braugher has the flashier supervisor role as New York Times managing editor Dean Baquet, who has some of the best scenes in the movie in showing how he’s not intimidated by a bully like Weinstein.

As for any portrayal of Weinstein, “She Said” wisely relegates him to just being mostly a voice, with a brief glimpses of an actor (Mike Houston) portraying Weinstein on screen, such as when he walks in a public area with members of his team. There’s a scene where Weinstein threatens Dean with legal action against The New York Times because of the investigation that he knows will expose dark secrets. In response, Dean tells Weinstein that if he wants to make any statements on the record, Weinstein needs to talk directly to Jodi and Megan.

“She Said” also includes the 2015 real-life audio recording of Weinstein trying and failing to coerce actress/model Ambra Battilana Gutierrez into his hotel suite, a day after she says he sexually groped her without her consent. She reported this crime to the New York Police Department, which investigated Weinstein for that incident at the time, but no charges were filed against him. It’s an example of how not all of Weinstein’s accusers waited years to come forward to report Weinstein’s alleged sexual misconduct against them. The movie shows in no uncertain terms that those who did go public before 2017 were silenced or ignored.

Also getting a “voice only” depiction in “She Said” is actress/activist Rose McGowan (voiced by Keilly McQuail), who is shown declining to be interviewed by The New York Times about her accusation that Weinstein raped her, because she says she felt mistreated by The New York Times in the past. In real life, McGowan would go on the record with Farrow for his coverage for The New Yorker. “She Said” also has a scene of Megan and Jodi going to Paltrow’s California home to interview this Oscar-winning “Shakespeare in Love” actress, but Paltrow is also just a phone voice in the movie. (Near the beginning of the movie, there’s also voice cameo from an actor portraying Donald Trump, who calls Megan in 2016, during his presidential campaign, to tell her that she’s a “disgusting human being” for reporting sexual harassment allegations against Trump.)

Early on in “She Said,” the movie acknlowedges that Weinstein’s downfall happened after the April 2017 downfall of former Fox News talk show host Bill O’Reilly over sexual harassment allegations. Sarah Anne Masse, who is one of Weinstein’s real-life accusers (she claims he sexually harassed her in a job interview), has a cameo role as New York Times reporter Emily Steel, who helped break the story about O’Reilly’s alleged sexual misconduct. Steel and Michael S. Schmidt co-wrote the New York Times report that exposed how News Corp. (the parent company of Fox News) paid at least $13 million to settle sexual-harassment complaints made against O’Reilly, who was eventually fired from Fox News when advertisers boycotted his show. (That settlement total is now estimated to be at least $32 million.)

“She Said” might get some comparisons to the Oscar-winning 2015 drama “Spotlight,” which was about the Boston Globe’s 2001-2002 investigation of the Catholic Church covering up priests’ sexual abuse for decades. In real life, that Boston Globe report also won a Pulitzer Prize, but “Spotlight” was very much about a male-majority team of journalists (with one token woman) doing the investigating. “She Said” is much more streamlined, because there is only one main sexual abuser being investigated, although the movie does hammer home the point many times that Weinstein was aided by a system that allowed him to get away with his crimes for years.

None of this information is surprising to anyone who followed the Weinstein scandal and the aftermath of what was reported in The New York Times and The New Yorker. There have been countless news reports and some documentaries of the same subject matter. What will resonate with viewers the most in “She Said” is exactly what the title of the movie promises: Instead of making the villain the center of the story (which true-crime movies tend to do), “She Said” is all about celebrating the bravery and fortitude of the women survivors who came forward to tell their truths, and the people who helped bring some measure of justice to stop Weinstein’s reign of terror.

Universal Pictures will release “She Said” in U.S. cinemas on November 18, 2022.