Looks great, but found it very inaccessible

Bound to be the year’s most controversial film, David Fincher’s “Mank” lays bare the various feuds and politics that surrounded screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman) before and during the creation of the screenplay for Orson Welle’s “Citizen Kane.”

“Kane” is long considered to be the best film of all time, but does anyone still alive even really remember it? If you do, you’ll have a great time here. Oldman is fantastic as a literate, frequently drunk loose cannon who wasn’t afraid to go against the grain of many of his peers. Fincher is, again, a technical wiz sure to appease any major film fan; his pristine black and white photography and the appearance of typewritten screenplay cues entering the top of the screen to let us know we’re in flashback is a nice touch. Arliss Howard, Charles Dance, and Amanda Seyfried as L.B. Mayer, William Randolph Hearst, and Marion Davies are well cast as out of touch media elites who would become the basis for Mank’s scorn. Even if you don’t remember “Kane”, you’ll enjoy these things.

Just the point of Jack Fincher’s (David’s late father) screenplay is a different matter. It’s dense with big important names and lavish parties where those big names talk about things you would need an encyclopedia to understand. So muddled is everything else here that the co-writing feud Mank has with Welles (Tom Burke) seems like almost an afterthought by movie’s end. Overall, it looks and sounds great, but is too inaccessible to feel a deeper connection with.


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