? The mysterious
death of TV’s first Superman, George Reeves, provides the basis for this
speculative drama. Adrien Brody plays a detective who’s hired to look into what
the police have called a suicide. The movie cuts back and forth between this
story and that of Reeves, an aspiring movie star who enters into a longstanding
affair with a studio boss’s wife (Diane Lane).
+ As with films like L.A.
Confidential, Paul Bernbaum’s script contrasts the manufactured image of
Tinseltown with the seedier reality. But that’s to be expected. More
interestingly, it tells the parallel stories of the detective, a huckster who
unexpectedly discovers his integrity, and Reeves, a would-be serious actor who
sacrifices his ideals and finds it hard to reclaim them. Lane and Brody are
terrific. The Reeves role plays to Affleck’s strengths, and perhaps best of all
is Bob Hoskins, a ferocious dinosaur of a studio boss.
- Nothing serious.
Some people might prefer a more definitive ending, but I wouldn’t have.
= ***1/2 Recommended
for anyone interested in an old-fashioned mystery, old Hollywood, or some
larger-than-life characters.
viewed at PFS screening
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