“The Post” is surprisingly lackluster. I expected a lot more from a production bearing the names Spielberg, Streep, and Hanks. The film is beautifully shot and has a unique supporting cast of character actors (David Cross, Bradley Whitford, Zach Woods), but the script has the excitement level of a news room. I mean, if you are going to take a lot of liberties with history, you’d might as well add some more drama to give your cast better acting opportunities. The main issue is that the script tells a singular story without many subplots and the characters don’t have a chance to transform. Beyond that, I didn’t understand some of Steven Spielberg’s decisions. “Let’s start with a war sequence solely to establish that one character feels that the war is hopeless but portray the rest of the story in a city without any reference to the opening. Plus, we need to get in another jab at Nixon so let’s throw a 20-second Watergate scene in at the end, even though the events of the film take place over 5 days and Watergate happens more than a year later.” Some aspects of the film just seemed very forced and not portrayed with the highest quality. Honestly, the best actor in the film was Bob Odenkirk, not because he had a great character to work with but because he’s entertaining in and of himself. Meryl Streep is the greatest actress of our generation but her performance lacked that “wow” moment that we expect in an Oscar-nominated role. The same goes for Tom Hanks following his noteworthy performances in “Sully” and “Bridge of Spies” over the past two years. You can see a bit of Steven Spielberg’s flair in the movement of the camera through the newsroom but the overall picture didn’t come together for me. There were movies more deserving of a Best Picture nomination but the film’s relevance to the current presidency’s battle with the press secured it a spot. “The Post” tells an interesting story but, considering the bodies of work of its major players, I don’t think that it will be remembered very far beyond this year’s award season.
[Pictured: "The Post" was disappointingly average and well below the caliber of its big names]
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