Review: State of Play (2009)

State of Play, the 2009 cinematic adaptation of the 2003 BBC One miniseries of the same name, is a film that has an ambitious, complex plot, some solid performances from it's cast, but in the end, stumbles over itself by trying to make a story built on shades of gray, into something more black and white, and therefore suffers.

Director Kevin Macdonald (The Last King of Scotland) goes for an astute, clinical aura for the film, and in doing so, creates a project more emotionally distant project. In many ways, it feels like a preclude of sorts for House of Cards, with a similar habit of distant shots showcasing Washington DC architecture, while mixing in a copious amount of hand held. It's far from bad direction, but it lacks a true sense of building tension, or immersion that I felt Macdonald wanted to emulate.

This film's largest flaw, however, is the screenplay. Crafted by Tony Gilroy (Michael Clayton), Matthew Michael Carnanhan (The Kingdom) and Billy Ray (Captain Phillips), the screenplay wants to focus on the moral ambiguities of politics that define this kind of a conspiracy film, and yet feels compelled to spell out who the bad guys are (private military contractors and their minions), and why it's all evil. On top of that, by integrating a subtext about the impending doom of print newspapers. Often pausing the conspiratorial paranoia to go on tangents about the nobility of old fashioned journalism, it creates a cloying sense of pretentiousness and specification that is unnecessary in a film that's already trying to speechify about the evil's of private military contractors and such. On top of that, in the years since, it's become rather apparent that print journalism is fading fast, and times are changing. This kind of bleeding heart objectification of the old ways feels a bit maudlin to be honest.

The good news is that the performances are all strong throughout. Russell Crowe does a good job at the grungy, unassuming yet persistent reporter Cal McCaffrey. He's a likable guy, and his interactions with Della, the up and coming blogger/reporter (Rachel McAdams, on point as always), are organic. His friendship with Ben Affleck's Congressmen Stephen Collins is good too, albeit it's hard to envision Russell Crowe going to college with Ben Affleck. Helen Mirren does a good job as Crowe's boss, and Jason Bateman does a wonderfully smarmy one scene wonder pull as a source that McAdams and Crowe go to. Robin Wright Penn, while good, however feels superfulious to the overarching narrative, as her subplot of her and Crowe's past romantic dalliances feels unnecessary, and distracts from the broader plot.

And all in all, that's how this film feels. Distracted. It wants to be both an ode to print journalism, a conspiracy thriller, and a character piece, but ends up splitting itself the three ways, and coming across as muddled.

Far from a horrible film, it still lacks the intrigue that defined Michael Clayton, which shares many similarities. It isn't as taunt or well paced, dragging sluggishly towards the end.

I suppose 3 out of 5 will do. A rather obvious case of So Okay, It's Average.