MANK - Netflix biopic on Herman Mankiewicz

[Wich2]

Yeah, Mank was the genius and Welles was the hitchhiker-opportunist. My tuchis.

At some point though, ala comix fandom's "Stan Lee Vs. Jack Kirby" nonsense, these pissing matches get silly.

There seems plenty of documented proof for both healthy-egoed men to have had threads of both genius and opportunist in their complex make-ups.

- Craig

[Steve Paradis]

There's a long article on Fincher and Mank in the NYT Magazine, probably paywalled:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/19/maga ... rview.html
The enthusiastic author describes him as America’s most famously exacting director . I can think of a few other pretenders to that title but all of them are dead.
Have to wonder if anyone but his father had written the script, would he have accepted it?
Hard to shake the feeling that Mank is Fincher's own Susan Alexander.

[Wich2]

The enthusiastic author describes him as America’s most famously exacting director . I can think of a few other pretenders to that title but all of them are dead.

In their own individual OCD ways:

Von Stroheim. Ford. Hitchcock. Kubrick. Cimino.

(That being said, my late pal Arthur Anderson did call Orson, "A genius - and a pain in the ass!")

[Wellesnet]

Mank (John Malkovich) and Welles (Liev Schreiber) go head to head over the Kane screenplay credit in RKO281:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsYDhVm ... LctW3mZt1E

Jonathon Rosenbaum gives some thoughts on the new film:
https://www.jonathanrosenbaum.net/2020/ ... U6xpy-HMfk

CBS Sunday Morning on Welles and Mank. Hosted by Ben Mankiewicz who interviews David Fincher:

[RayKelly]

Film historian Joseph McBride revisits the authorship of “Citizen Kane” after screening David Fincher's "Mank." He examines the movie’s flawed script, and how some lesser filmmakers are intimidated by Orson Welles and feel the need to tear him down.

https://www.wellesnet.com/mank-welles-mcbride/

[tonyw]

Excellent article by Joe and pithy comments by our very own JR. One tragedy of this film was that money was available to make it, and not for completing and restoring Welles's other unfinished projects.

[atcolomb]

Very good article by Joseph McBride and i still want to see MANK when it comes out on Netflix. Have the dvd of RKO 281 but's it's been years since i have seen it so i will have to give it another look soon.

[Steve Paradis]

Very good article by Joseph McBride and i still want to see MANK when it comes out on Netflix. Have the dvd of RKO 281 but's it's been years since i have seen it so i will have to give it another look soon.

Do you remember anything of it? Me neither, and why would you want to rewatch an unmemorable picture? Me And Orson Welles at least has Christian McKay, and the Macbeth and Julius Caesar reconstructions. And Norman Lloyd's response elsewhere. Enjoyed his remark about the impossibility of George Coulouris's stagefright. Apparently if you go to his gravesite and whisper Five minutes, Mr.Coulouris the ground will start to shake.

[atcolomb]

Very good article by Joseph McBride and i still want to see MANK when it comes out on Netflix. Have the dvd of RKO 281 but's it's been years since i have seen it so i will have to give it another look soon.

Do you remember anything of it? Me neither, and why would you want to rewatch an unmemorable picture? Me And Orson Welles at least has Christian McKay, and the Macbeth and Julius Caesar reconstructions. And Norman Lloyd's response elsewhere. Enjoyed his remark about the impossibility of George Coulouris's stagefright. Apparently if you go to his gravesite and whisper Five minutes, Mr.Coulouris the ground will start to shake.

I know there are a lot of issues with RKO 281 but will have some free time around the Holiday's so i will give it one more look and after that will view Me and Orson Welles.

[Wellesnet]

Good video short on the controversy:



******

Deflating myths about Orson Welles (by GABRIEL M. PALETZ) :
https://www.wellesnet.com/fincher-myths ... rLuIP-blEs

[atcolomb]

New York Times review of Mank. Maybe tonight or over the weekend i will watch it.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/03/movi ... eview.html

[Steve Paradis]

Mark Kermode gives it the Willy Loman verdict--liked but not well-liked--and demolishes the premise.
And this may be Charles Dance's run at an Oscar.
At 1:25:11
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000ppyz

[Le Chiffre]

Watched it this morning. I was disappointed but intrigued by some of it. The film has some interesting ideas, such as Bernstein being based on Louis B. Mayer, and Mank calling him Sancho Panza to Hearst's Don Quixote (with Marion as Dulcinea), but overall I found the film too static and talky, and doesn't move with half the grace of the average Welles film. I saw that clearly when I watched parts of Kane right after. The MANK script could have used a Welles.

I actually got somewhat bored at times, as the alternating stories, spaced a few years apart, make it look like the film is going around in circles rather than going towards a specific, conjoining theme or point. At the end, I didn't really see what Welles's supposed egomania and credit hogging in 1941 had to do with Hearst using media for political ends in 1934.

Also, the black and white footage, highly praised in some reviews, didn't impress me all that much, although there are a few stunning shots here and there. The performances are mostly serviceable (Oldman is good as usual), although the dialogue sometimes sounds like it's being read rather than performed (I have the same problem with some of Woody Allen's later films).

One thing I found curious: Houseman and Mank are working on the Kane script while Welles calls and says he is at the studio doing make-up tests for HEART OF DARKNESS. I had always thought that the Kane script was done in a slight atmosphere of desperation because HOD and Welles's other proposed projects had already been rejected by RKO.

The Welles bashing towards the end seems gratuitous, although Welles is given a valid argument in the climactic battle over screen credit, since Mankiewicz did indeed renege on his original agreement to write the first couple of drafts for money instead of credit. The film seems to imply that Welles thought this betrayal was due to all the booze; hence, the smashing of the liquor bottles.

I doubt that Welles's legacy will suffer much damage from this film, since it's hard to imagine it getting that large or enthusiastic of an audience. Despite many good reviews, I would be surprised if it got that much attention at awards time. I'll probably check it out on Netflix a couple of more times, though. There is a lot to it that's difficult to grasp on one viewing.

***

From Joe McBride's article:
"The Finchers’ evident thematic intent is to show Mank heroically rallying, for once in his life, to write something of great value but almost being bullied out of credit by a craven, arrogant thief. To pull off that magic trick of storytelling, Fincher and his late father must (1) refer to what Mank is writing as “the first draft”; (2) ignore the previous weeks Mankiewicz and Welles spent together in Hollywood working out the structure and characters of what became Citizen Kane; (3) ignore the parallel draft of the script Welles was working on in Beverly Hills at the same time Mank was writing his long draft in Victorville, some of which was being sent down to Welles to revise; (4) fail to depict the visit or visits Welles paid to Victorville while Mank was writing...(5) downplay as mere “editing” or “noodling” the numerous drafts Welles did in reworking their early work in at least seven drafts; and (6) ignore Welles’s constant revisions even through shooting."

A copy of Welles's "parallel draft" would probably put the whole credit issue to bed for good. Too bad it doesn't exist anymore. Or does it?

[RayKelly]

One thing I found curious: Houseman and Mank are working on the Kane script while Welles is at the studio doing make-up tests for HEART OF DARKNESS. I had always thought that the Kane script was done in a slight atmosphere of desperation because HOD and Welles's other proposed projects had already been rejected by RKO.

The makeup tests were October 1939 -- several months before Victorville.

[atcolomb]

Finished watching Mank and i thought it was good. Great cinematography and the acting was fine. It does help if you know your Hollywood history. You do get the impression at the end that Mank did all the work on Citizen Kane which is not the case.