News of the World
UNIVERSALAdapted from Paulette Jiles’ 2016 western novel, News of the World tells the story of Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd (Tom Hanks), a Texas traveller who goes from town to town in order to bring and recount the so-called ‘news of the world’, fascinating tales about what is happening outside the local walls. During one of his trips, he encounters a little girl in the woods, Johanna (Helena Zengel), and decides to help her find a new place to stay. For his first attempt in the western genre, Paul Greengrass shows a slight shift in style, as the filmmaker puts aside those frenetic and intense camera movements that characterised his filmography (Captain Phillips and United 93 especially) to craft a more deliberately-paced movie. Moreover, Captain Phillips also marked the first collaboration between Hanks and Greengrass and the final result was excellent, arguably one of the best performances given by the former.
From the outset, the expectations of News of the World were quite high and the role of Captain Kidd seemed perfectly suited for Hanks as it plays on his strengths; the actor has always brought a huge charismatic presence in each character he plays and has often been cast as the good guy, the ‘everyman’, whom the audience could relate to. It’s no exception here either. Tom Hanks is very good in the sequences where Captain Kidd recounts the ‘news of the world’, even though Greengrass could have emphasised this aspect more. The actor shares good chemistry with Helena Zengel. At first, the relationship between Captain Kidd and Johanna is difficult because of the language barrier and the traumatised state of the latter, but once the two start travelling together, they open up and develop a sort of father-daughter relationship.
Each interaction between the Captain and Johanna is warm and tender, with the Captain helping the audience understand why this new bond is so important to him: he has been travelling for years by himself and he’s still grieving for his wife, and through Johanna he finds a new purpose. Newcomer, Helena Zengel is effective in her rather limited role. She is very good in portraying the distressed state of her character, showing some glances of the intensity the German actress brought to her stunning portrayal of a problematic child in Systemcrasher. Other than the aforementioned scenes with Hanks, she does not have much to do because of her underwritten role. As for the rest of the supporting cast, it is either wasted (Mare Winningham and Bill Camp just have one scene each and they’re not able to make a great impact with their little screen time) or terrible (Michael Angelo Covino’s villainous turn comes off as ridiculous; each movement and every delivery of a line is way too over the top).
The central relationship between Captain Kidd and Johanna is the focus point of the story and it works mostly because of its two performers. But at the end, it’s nothing that hasn’t been seen before. The emotional pay-off is predictable and barely satisfying. The script itself has a lot of issues; it doesn’t really take advantage of the ‘news of the world’ sequences and the attempt to make a statement about the conflict between natives and settlers turns out to be hollow and never explored in-depth. The repetitive episodic structure of the movie doesn’t help either, with the two main characters going from town to town encountering and overcoming new troubles and obstacles.
From a technical point of view, News of the World does not disappoint. The movie is gorgeously photographed by Darius Wolski with the use of indoor lighting proving effective, especially during Captain Kidd’s speeches, and the landscape shots are beautifully crafted. James Newton Howard’s score is serviceable as it tries to create that epic western atmosphere, and the costume designs by Mark Bridges are quite good as well. The action set-pieces are more than solid (such as the chase scene in the first half of the movie or the shooting between in the rocks) but, just like the other technical aspects and the movie as a whole, they are neither impressive nor memorable.
News of the World is not a bad picture, just a disappointing one. Paul Greengrass had everything within his reach to craft something special but, instead, the final result is the typical ‘dad movie’ to be watched on a Sunday afternoon, and that’s quite disappointing if one takes into consideration all the talented people who worked in it.