Director Allen Coulter’s Hollywoodland
posits itself as a
true that it has at its center, in the death of actor George Reeves, a doozy of
a high-profile homicide. But a straight historical whodunit this isn’t — Hollywoodland is instead very much a
film about the warped intersection of celebrity, ambition and regular life, and
the unique commingling of aspiration and desperation that its Tinseltown
setting produces.
wife and young son in the Valley, but he still has a single man’s irresponsibility
hardwired to his being, hustling tips for whatever jobs he can from a former
partner. When he’s advised that the distraught but somewhat estranged mother
(Lois Smith) of Superman TV star
George Reeves (Ben Affleck) isn’t buying the official police ruling of suicide
in the death of her son, Simo sees not only a lucrative payday, but also a high-profile
gig that will boost his shingle for years to come, and get him out of the cheating-hearts
business of stringing along petty, paranoid husbands who’re convinced their
wives are cheating on them.
Simo dives into the case, and finds all sorts of
incongruities, including some strange bullet holes in the floor, and potential
signs of a struggle. The film, then, flashes back to show us Reeves’ long-term relationship
with older woman Toni Mannix (Diane Lane), the wife of film executive Eddie Mannix
(Bob Hoskins), a powerful and more than slightly menacing figure at MGM. Eddie knew
of the duo’s arrangement, and tacitly approved — after all, he had his own
mistress. But Reeves’ eventual shaking free from his “kept-boy” chains (while
Toni kept him living in comfort and style, he resented that she never did more
for his career), and subsequent engagement to money-hungry fiancée Leonore
Lemmon (a perfectly off-balance Robin Tunney), may have earned him enmity that could
have fueled a hasty, jealous attempt on his life — one that could then look
somewhat like suicide.
At least this is what Simo speculates, and the film
indulges. Hollywoodland cops a bit of
its moves from L.A. Confidential, there’s
no doubt, but the set and art design work is so superlative, that you find
yourself quickly immersed in its world, and giving in to its yarn of multi-layered,
overlapping motivations (a dilemma that the recently released, somewhat similar
The Black Dahlia never conquered). The
problem is that the flashback structure (we bounce around from 1951 to ’59) is somewhat
at odds with Simo’s present day investigation, and the film lacks a clear resolution.
Definitive “truth” need not be uncovered, but restiveness must be quelled by
some sense of finality. Hollywoodland
doesn’t have that.
While there’s an admirable, very adult restraint in Hollywoodland’s refusal to offer up a
single, wildly conjectural opinion on the death (as well as, I’m sure, some
very compelling legal reasons not to do so), in the end the movie doesn’t quite fully gel and pull off the feat of
leaving you shaken, stunned or wowed by the canvas of conspiratorial hush-hush
it presents. What it does provide the
opportunity for is a nice display by its cast, particularly Brody and Lane, and a collection of ambitious, damaged characters more alike than they realize. Even
casual film fans will be caught up enough by these performances to find more reward
than complaint in Hollywoodland.
Presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen that preserves the
aspect ratio of its initial theatrical exhibition, Hollywoodland comes with matching English and French language Dolby
digital 5.1 surround sound audio tracks, as well as optional subtitles in
English, Spanish and French. An audio commentary track with Coulter kicks off
the slate of supplemental features, and it’s a nice, relaxed chat in which he
discusses scene-to-scene directorial choices, and talks a lot about the
collaboration with various actors, including Brody, for whom he has much
praise. There’s also a five-minute collection of deleted scenes, which further
flesh out Simo’s investigations. A trio of short, comparative featurettes on
the recreating of old-time
more appreciation for the film’s behind-the-scenes players, since much of it
was filmed in