The Post is a 2017 biography/drama directed by Steven Spielberg. The film stars Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Sarah Paulson, Bob Odenkirk, Tracy Letts, Bradley Whitford, Bruce Greenwood, Carrie Coon, and Matthew Rhys. Set in the early 1970s, The Post depicts the true story of the journalists from The Washington Post and their attempts to publish the Pentagon Papers, classified documents regarding undisclosed information about the involvement of the United States government in the Vietnam War.
Ugh. This is a pretty hard film to review. After seeing this film’s first trailer awhile back, I was beyond stoked to go out and see this movie. As award season started ramping up and this film was getting some major acclaim I was even more pumped.. and then.. I saw it. Before I say anymore, this is not a bad film and it’s not a fantastic one either. Not only did Spielberg rush this into production, but you can also really feel it at times. Some times this film is very messy and lacks attention to detail, and sadly The Post was a disappointing film for me as I came into the new year.
So to start things off, the acting in this film.. was par. You’d think this would have been a perfect film for Streep to show off her talent, but yet her character is boring and her acting portrays that as well. Although Hanks was the best thing about this film, even he didn’t feel like he was on his game, as his character (and almost every other character for that matter) lacked true depth. No one else except for Bob Odenkirk really stood out, and this film’s acting was just sub par.. even with such a great cast.
The Post really suffered from a variety of small issues that eventually manifested itself into a sub par film. A lot of the pacing in this film just felt off, as it never really picked up until the third act, and there are some scenes in this film like it’s Vietnam opening that just really bogged down this film’s serious tone. One of my biggest gripes had to be with the way the film portrays women, as it almost felt sexist at times in the sense that a man is trying to make a film about women and doesn’t know how to accurately do that. There are a couple scenes littered like that all over this film, and to be honest they made me want to puke. If you want to make a film about strong women.. let a woman do it. There are plenty of great female directors out there that could have done a better job than Spielberg. Plenty!
As I mentioned above, the pacing in this film was pretty slow for a majority of the movie, and it really had to deal with the way the story is told. Although this is a pretty decent film, trust me when I say this.. it should have been a documentary. There were times where narration would have been a hell-of-a-lot better than music, and it would have helped cut the time down from almost two hours (!) down to something like maybe an hour and ten minutes.
Although I’ve been pretty hard on this film, it still had some pretty great aspects to it. The film was beautifully shot, and Spielberg has some absolutely stunning long takes in this film and some great camera angles. Not only did this film look great, but it also sounded great with one of the best scores for a film that didn’t really need that good of a score. Like don’t get me wrong I love a good score.. but a film about a newspaper doesn’t really need a John Williams score.. does it?
There’s not really anything else to talk about with this film. It’s a decent movie with decent acting, and although I wish it was done by someone else, Spielberg has some truly beautiful visuals and music featured in this film. Although this movie didn’t blow me away like I was hoping it would, I did find some enjoyment out of it. By no means is this film deserving of an Oscar other than it’s score, and because of that I decided to give The Post a “Good” on theVade Review Bar. There are some truly great biographical films out there.. but this ain’t one of them.
