The “Me Too” movement is one of the events in recent memory that really changed our culture and how the way people today live in society. There were many stories that came out about powerful figures abusing their power and the survivors who had to live with that trauma. Roger Ailes, the CEO of Fox News, was one of the biggest to come out. Now Bombshell is being released, the telling of that story. How will this first film about this movement be portrayed? With a very heavy hand. Bombshell takes a very important subject and handles it with the care that the women it is about should’ve received from their boss.
Bombshell is the story about the women of Fox News who were sexually abused and harassed by their boss Roger Ailes. Specifically, the focus is on Megyn Kelly (Charlize Theron), Gretchen Carlson (Nicole Kidman), and a new character named Kayla Pospisil (Margot Robbie). This is a rather recent story that was heavily publicized when it came to fruition. So recent that another form of entertainment tackled this exact same subject just a couple months ago. The Loudest Voice was a series of Showtime starring Russell Crowe as Roger Ailes. It told the relatively same story as Bombshell just in a different way. Difference being The Loudest Voice was from Ailes’ perspective while Bombshell is about the women he abused. You may be wondering why we need two stories about the same thing? It’s because this is important subject materialthat needs to be told right. The Loudest Voice was a very informative series that was acted terrifically by Crowe, but this story is about the women and is why the movie is better than the show. Doesn’t mean the movie is without its problems, but this material deserves to be seen onscreen and Bombshell does is very well.
The biggest problem with Bombshell is the structure in which it is told. The material is strong and the message it is conveying to the audience is so important, it is just not put together very well. We know movies to follow a simple structure, a beginning, middle, and end or through three acts. Bombshell does not follow that framework and it falters because of it. We are following three individual women and the film does its best to give them all an equal amount of time. Problem is when their stories do not crossover, it can feel like you have three different movies going on at once and they almost force them to share scenes when it is unnatural in the story. The elevator scene you see in the trailer where they all get in at the same time is full of tension that ultimately goes nowhere and lands with a thud. It may seem like I am ragging on this movie and truth is I actually really enjoyed it, the structure is just so subpar that it brings down something that could’ve been great. That is not to say there is nothing to love.
What Bombshell does well that drives home its point is the approach Jay Roach took. He focused mostly on the subject material and wanted to make the audience sit in the dirt of these confrontations these women had with Roger. You feel absolutely disgusted and with every interaction, you just become angrier at how this was able to go on for so long. The stuff he would allow his male employees to say on air and how degrading they were towards their female coworkers is just despicable. Roach puts this difficult material in the hands of his actresses and they just destroy it. Charlize Theron disappears into the role of Megyn Kelly. She looks exactly like her and has the powerful persona Kelly always conveyed on television. She plays the lead in this film and what Theron does is astounding. Nicole Kidman has a surprisingly smaller role then I would’ve imagined but her role as Gretchen is one of the most important. She gets the ball rolling on the accusations and without the grandness Kidman brings, the role would’ve felt empty. These two are awesome but one other key character really stands out.
Margot Robbie plays a character written for this film alone. We saw this with Mark Wahlberg’s character in Patriots Day. The character of Kayla Pospisil does not exist, and you may wonder what the point of that character is? Well that reason is to drive home the point of the story. This film is all about women speaking up and standing together against someone who abuses their power. The character of Kayla falls into the trap of Ailes abusing her against her own will when it could’ve been prevented. That is what I love so much about this movie. While Megyn Kelly and Gretchen Carlson where sexually abused, they also allowed it to go on with other women. That is what Margot’s character is there for, to call them out for allowing Roger to go on. I have stated before in another article that I believe Margot Robbie is the most fascinating actress working today and this film just cemented that. She takes this innocent character and slowly breaks her down emotionally to where she is now living with something that can never go away. Margot sells the hell out of it as this cautionary tale we should all hope our friends never comes to fruition.
So while Bombshell suffers from a structure that can be hard to grasp, the strength of its message and powerful performances by its cast more than make up for it. This is the type of film everyone should see to see not only what some may not be aware of, but also warn people of what can happen if it is not stopped. Expect Oscar nominations for Charlize Theron and Margot Robbie this awards season with the film having a shot at best picture. It may not be the easiest film to watch, but it is certainly a worth while one.
The Verdict