Year:  2017

Director:  Steven Spielberg

Rated:  M

Release:  April 25, 2018

Distributor: eOne

Running time: 177 minutes

Worth: $14.00
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Cast:
...essentially functions as rousing tribute to clear-eyed, ethical journalism - quite the jarring anomaly in a time when even the most irreproachable reporting is frequently and publicly dismissed as corrupt, biased, and broken.

Intro:
...essentially functions as rousing tribute to clear-eyed, ethical journalism - quite the jarring anomaly in a time when even the most irreproachable reporting is frequently and publicly dismissed as corrupt, biased, and broken.

Steven Spielberg’s none-more-timely real life political drama The Post posits Tom Hanks’ Ben Bradlee as the dogged avatar of a principled free press, the Nixon Administration as, well, the Nixon Administration, and puts Meryl Streep’s Katharine Graham, socialite-turned-publisher of the eponymous Washington Post, in the hot seat as an untested woman who must balance the ethics of journalism against the more pragmatic requirements of running a news organ that is both beholden to risk-adverse stakeholders and liable for legal prosecution if it does what we the audience all know to be The Right Thing.

Of course, Streep and Hanks do end up doing The Right Thing, as history tells us, but in this case it’s the journey, not the destination, plus the resonance with contemporary issues in this current dark age of “fake news”, “bias”, Fox & Friends, military adventurism, and so on. The distance between The Post‘s 1972 setting and the current year does not seem particularly large at times.

Except, perhaps, when you look at the gender politics of the time, which are an eye-opener. The Post takes place at a point when men still withdrew to the drawing room for some post-dinner-party real talk while their wives gossiped and swapped recipes and make up tips. It’s a milieu that Streep’s Washington society matron is effortlessly comfortable in. She’s less confident when it comes to making her mark as the big dog at the newspaper following her husband’s suicide – especially when she and her editor, Hanks’ Bradlee, must decide what to do with The Pentagon Papers, a damning Department of Defence report on the rolling disaster that was the US’s involvement in the Vietnam War. Publishing is clearly in the public interest and could put the Post – then a relatively small paper – in the big leagues. However, a court injunction against the New York Times over their prior publication of the material, and the nervousness of the Post‘s board in the lead-up to a stock market float, make the decision less straight forward.

The Post‘s obvious precedent is Alan J. Pakula’s 1976 film All the President’s Men and, indeed, Spielberg’s effort serves as a kind of prequel thereof (Tom Hanks is playing the same real life character that Jason Robards played, if you’re keeping score). The Berg’s classical, restrained Serious Movie style is even a decent match for Pakula’s, although when All the President’s Men was made it was a contemporary drama, while The Post has the burnished patina of a historical drama (compare Spielberg’s recent Bridge of Spies).

However, what really rings as nostalgic is the film’s faith in a robust and forthright fourth estate. While much is made of how the paper is beholden to its board of directors and their economic concerns, it essentially functions as rousing tribute to clear-eyed, ethical journalism – quite the jarring anomaly in a time when even the most irreproachable reporting is frequently and publicly dismissed as corrupt, biased, and broken. Spielberg’s film is clearly meant to be a paean to the free press, but seen through the cynical lens of the current age, it occasionally feels simplistic, even naive.

Still, The Post remains a rock solid, gripping drama, thanks to Spielberg’s steady hand on the tiller and strong performances both from the principals (although Hanks occasionally drifts towards pantomime) and an excellent supporting cast that includes  Sarah Paulson, Bob Odenkirk, Tracy Letts, Bradley Whitford, David Cross, Bruce Greenwood, Carrie Coon, and Matthew Rhys. When we look back on Spielberg’s career this will probably be considered a minor work, but minor ‘Berg is still worth your time.

Special Features on the Blu-ray release include a number of insightful featurettes:

LAYOUT: Katharine Graham, Ben Bradlee & The Washington Post
EDITORIAL: The Cast and Characters of The Post
THE STYLE SECTION: Recreating an Era
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT: Music for The Post

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