Why a Movie About 1930s Hollywood Resonates Today
The screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz is an odd sight on a glamorous Old Hollywood movie set. As played by Gary Oldman in David Fincher’s new biographical film, Mank, he’s a disheveled figure on the sidelines, an acclaimed New York wordsmith brought to serve as a cog in a giant Los Angeles machine. During a movie shoot, “Mank” makes a wisecrack that gets him summoned to the tent of William Randolph Hearst, the famous newspaper magnate and movie producer (played by Charles Dance). To Hearst, Mankiewicz is little more than a court jester, an amusing addition to his collection of oddball pals. To Mankiewicz, Hearst represents something more serious and frightening.
Today, Mankiewiczthe Orson Welles masterpiece widely interpreted as a scathing critique of Hearst and the tycoon class he belonged to. And although some of (which debuts in theaters Friday and on Netflix next month) is concerned with the arduous process of writing ’s first draft, Fincher’s film has a grander scope. It interrogates the fragile dynamic between creator and mogul that’s essential to the Hollywood business of hammering art into commerce, whether in the 1930s or today. In Mankiewicz, Fincher has found a, a man who tried to reckon with an industry that so often puts business before authenticity—and ended up writing what is considered the best .
