Review: Mank

Mank, directed by David Fincher, tells the tale of Herman J. Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman), an intelligent, eccentric, alcoholic writer who is approached by Orson Welles (Tom Burke) to write a screenplay for his first feature film. As Mank secludes himself writing what would be his crowning achievement, he reflects back at the many relationships he forged over the years, some fond, others sour, one in particular the basis on which he writes his screenplay about.

This is the latest from director David Fincher with a script written by his father prior to his passing, and it was a film I was looking forward to for some time. All of Fincher’s films have been brilliant in their own right, however after finally being able to see this film on Netflix there isn’t much I could talk about that stood out to me in particular. Mank is no doubt a good movie, but disappointingly “good” is about as best as I can describe it.

Fincher has a reputation for being a technical wiz kid behind the camera, and the technology here is certainly impressive. There’s a lot of old school Hollywood tricks here being utilized that looks incredible in today’s standards. The use of CG is meaningful and perfectly hidden, the set designs are intricate, and the black-and-white aesthetic works incredibly well in the film’s favor.

All the performances were, as expected in a Fincher flick, pretty solid overall. Gary Oldman was solid as the title character, Amanda Seyfried was particularly note-worthy in this film, Tom Burke emulates Orson Welles so well, the cast overall was great. The writing’s as sharp and witty as Mank himself, the music from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is beautiful and somewhat nostalgic of classic Hollywood, and the little fine details from the make-up to the lighting really elevates this film from most biopics today.

Now while the technical details about this film are all wonderful, they’re not enough to make this film one of the best of the year, especially when the meat of the film is in itself underwhelming. There’s not much to the story of how Citizen Kane is written; Mank as a character was kind of 2-Dimentional. The film portrays Mank as a bitter writer working for a thankless industry hounded by people he personally detests. There isn’t really a character arc to be had with Mank; he doesn’t change the way he thinks by the ending nor was there any real emotional heft to Mank’s decision to claim credit for writing Citizen Kane, Mank is just a bitter, witty writer writing this screenplay as a form of vague catharsis against William Randolph Hearst, which Citizen Kane is loosely about.

Welles purists might take issue with the fact that this film seems to take the position of “Welles didn’t write a goddamn thing about Kane” that film critic Pauline Kael made popular in her infamous essay about Citizen Kane; Jack Fincher’s initial screenplay was based in part on Kael’s essay. There were a lot of moments in the film that seemed pretty unrealistic when compared to the actual story of the making of Kane, one scene in particular the film’s climax. By the end of the film I left feeling as if I didn’t take home anything of value from this film; it’s a straight-forward biopic and nothing more.

Overall I had fun watching this film, but it really isn’t all that memorable. There’s enough in it for me to thoroughly recommend it to everyone at least once, but there’s not enough for me to ponder about its hidden meanings and minute details. This was a very underwhelming film by Fincher’s standards, but even then it’s still an overall well made and enjoyable film. Go check it out and see for yourself.

Final Verdict: 7/10