Female Film Critics 24/375
For anyone who hears the name “E. Jean Carroll” and thinks “that woman who sued Donald Trump,” do yourself a favor and watch Ivy Meeropol’s engaging documentary Ask E. Jean sooner than later. Because, yes, Carroll did do that, but she’s also done so much more (let’s just say that you don’t get nicknamed “the female Hunter S. Thompson” for being boring), and she deserves to be just as well known for all of that, too.
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Ask E. Jean exceeded even those high expectations. I thought I knew E. Jean Carroll thanks to her landmark 2019 defamation lawsuit again Donald Trump but this comprehensive film delivers so much more. Elegantly edited by Leah Goudsmit and Ferne Pearlstein, Ask E. Jean follows Carroll’s early life and fascinating career as a prolific writer and advice columnist during the glory days of high end magazines. Through its archival footage of Carroll in the 80s and 90s and interviews with her today, the film puts sexual abuse, rape, harassment and the repercussions for women who report the crime into social and cultural context.
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A fascinating and disturbing documentary has released at SXSW called My NDA. To be honest, my interest was piqued seeing it was co-directed by one of my favorite character actors, Miriam Shor, whom you might know from Younger and Pluribus. Having covered women in the film and tv industry for years, I’ve been aware of the destructive nature of NDAs and their disproportionate impact on women, so I figured her own experience inspired her desire to talk about the issue. She had my attention. Gratefully, My NDA, which is co-directed by Juliane Dressner not only kept my attention, it did so with emotion and authenticity, while making clear how NDAs can affect anyone and everyone in all corners of society.
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Long before real estate mogul Donald Trump hired wannabe business executives to be his protégés on a reality television show, there was a rude and remorseless, pompous and pandering New York lawyer named Roy Cohn who brought a young Trump into his legal laboratory and groomed him in his image. This transformation is the basis of the biographical film The Apprentice.
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What we talk about when we talk about The Apprentice is Jeremy Strong in the role of Roy Cohn, a performance of such ferocity and richness that a viewer is left slack-jawed in wonder. But The Apprentice is essentially a film about how Trump became Trump; besides Roy Cohn’s influence, the movie covers the 1970s and ‘80s version of Trump — his marriage to Ivana (Maria Bakalova), his failed casinos in Atlantic City, what looks like a growing reliance on amphetamines, and so on. It’s an often amusing tale, but essentially tragic. Director Ali Abbasi shows the long-gone crumbs of humanity in Donald Trump; the notion of Trump starting out as an inept, easily impressed young man is an interesting take. Expect heated viewer arguments after every screening — always a good sign.
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Last October, Nature set loose a terrible disease. It was named, in the scientific fashion, Covid 19, for the year it started and for “corona,” describing the virus. Alex Gibney, along with Ophelia Harutyunyan, and Suzanne Hillinger, has directed a fiery documentary blast at the handling of the pandemic in America by the Trump Administration.
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Deciding to adapt former FBI director James Comey’s 2018 memoir A Higher Loyalty for Showtime’s series The Comey Rule, writer/director Billy Ray faced a daunting task. He needed to present extensively reported well-known recent events accurately and dramatically, while also adding insightful information. Ray meets this challenge by finding the heart of the story not in added details but in the conflict of an ethical individual handling political dynamite.
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As FBI Director, James Comey was placed in an untenable position during the final days of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 Presidential campaign against Donald Trump, as he struggled to be an apolitical public servant in today’s America. Adapted and directed by Billy Ray, this two-part mini-series is based on Comey’s memoir A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies and Leadership, with Jeff Daniels playing Comey and Brendan Gleeson as Donald Trump, interspersed with actual TV news reports.
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In this documentary, filmmaker Ivy Meeropol never loses track of the connection between Roy Cohn and his mentee, Donald J. Trump, strengthening the link in the chain between the two as she films another chapter in Trump’s origin story. Bully. Coward. Villain. has the advantage of compassion, but it is still righteously damning.
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Ava DuVernay’s incisive and shocking documentary 13th hit like a body blow when she first unveiled it in the autumn 2016 film festivals. Donald Trump had not yet been “elected” President of the United States, but already, the shock of him ascending to the status of Republican nominee was unsettling. Fast forward to *checks watch* now, and this is a brutal and necessary watch.
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