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"Hollywoodland is a period-piece thriller about the mysterious death of TV's
original Superman, George Reeves. But underneath that 1959 mystery that a
down-on-his-luck detective (Adrien Brody) tries to unravel is one of the
smartest movies about fame and Hollywood to come along in ages. Go ahead, crave
the fame, the movie says. But ask, "How much is enough?" Service the career, but
decide, going in, where you draw the line, morally. And figure out, in advance,
how you would deal with that label "has been" or "never made it" when people
apply it to you.
Hollywoodland hums along on a handful of Oscar-worthy performances. There's Ben
Affleck, seen in flashback as Reeves, a modestly dashing leading man who never
got to lead, a long-employed wannabe who took the "crummy" TV show out of
desperation and who saw his dreams crash because of it. Diane Lane wears every
minute of her 41 years in portraying Toni Mannix, the older-woman who "kept"
Reeves, the wife of a menacing MGM honcho (a ferocious Bob Hoskins). Robin
Tunney is the brazen, gold-digging "fiancee" who may know more about this death
than she's letting on.
All fall under the suspicion of Louis Simo, the gumshoe hired by Reeves' mom
(Lois Smith) to find out what "really" happened to her boy. His TV show had been
canceled. He was having trouble finding work. And then, during a party in June
1959, he turned up naked and dead in the house Toni Mannix bought for him.
Reeves, who was so promising as a bit player in Gone With the Wind, was a
serious has-been/never-was when TV made him immortal. Affleck, in what is his
most fully formed, hide-the-movie-star performance, lets us see the charm, the
ambition and the pain of the TV "Man of Steel". The script lets Affleck play
Reeves as a proud man, an actor with a sense of dignity. Affleck revels in the
momentary glory that millions upon millions of American kids gave Reeves, and
winces when Reeves' role is reduced in From Here to Eternity because audiences
see him only as the fellow in the padded tights. His TV fame meant an end to his
dreams of stardom built on his talent, and Affleck lets us feel that.
Brody is the ostensible star of this, giving the screen yet another cynical,
rebel-without-a-tie private eye. But Affleck is the revelation here. He hasn't
acted this much in ages. Lane, playing a woman fully aware of her trophy-wife
status, and that she has "seven good years" left in her looks, lays it all out
as a lonely soul clinging to youth, sex and happiness through Reeves. It's a raw
performance, and she gives this character fathomless depths of love, jealousy
and fear.
Hoskins and Tunney are two kinds of flat-out scary. Tunney (Prison Break,
Cherish) was born to play femme fatales, and Hoskins grows more menacing with
each passing year, which is what made his funny turn in Mrs.Henderson Presents
so novel.
Director Allen Coulter cut his teeth on TV series from Sex and the City to The
Sopranos, and if Holly- woodland has a flaw, it's that it has the texture, the
look and the feel of TV. There's nothing fancy in the direction, nothing flashy
in the camera work, and the movie lacks the tone of film noir, the richness of
movie memory, the oversaturated colors that imbue modern thrillers set in that
era with their lurid appeal.
But like those TV series, this is a character actor's showcase. From Brody, a
leading man thanks to his Oscar -- but really a character lead -- to Hoskins,
Lane, Tunney and even Affleck, these are compact, indelible performances that
signal who and what their characters are in an instant. Bit players from Molly
Parker to Richard Fancy stand out. Joe Spano, a veteran of TV's Hill Street
Blues, perfectly suggests the quiet cunning of infamous MGM "fixer" Howard
Strickling, who kept ugly stories off the police blotter and out of the news.
It's just another sordid tale from a city famous for them. But Hollywoodland
explains so much about today's Hollywood, from the cozy ways the cops have
always played ball with the studios and stars, to the career-killing pain of
type-casting.
Here is the dream fulfilled, laid bare for a world of wannabes. And it's not
just dashed hopes that leave some dreamers fretting. It's the ones that come
true.
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