‘Mank’ Review: The Melancholy of Genius

In his latest directorial feature, David Fincher opts for a deceptively simple title that, similar to the film itself, captures the elusive complexity of a towering, fragile mind. Beneath its rich cinematic layers, “Mank” is a meditation on common anxieties: loneliness, moral corruption, the inevitability of change. Set in large part during the Great Depression, the film tracks American screenwriter Herman J. “Mank” Mankiewicz’s race to finish the script of “Citizen Kane” in under 60 days.

Rather than tell a linear story, “Mank” uses frequent flashbacks to portray the titular character’s mounting bitterness toward the movers and shakers of Hollywood. The result is a mosaic of power, vice, and ambition that builds — through the gradual convergence of its many moving parts — to a stunning thesis on art and individualism in a rapidly modernizing world.

With its hefty set pieces and mellow black-and-white aesthetic, Fincher’s film succeeds in resuscitating the kinetic chaos of 1930s Hollywood — glamorous on the outside and festering at its core. Fountains of champagne and gilded menageries belie the darker subtexts of political disinformation, class warfare, and labor exploitation that defined the industry. Structurally and thematically, “Mank,” similar to “Citizen Kane,” harkens back to a time before the pollution of ideals and purpose — before the Great Depression; before the moral disintegration of an industry; and before Mankiewicz’s quietly seething disillusionment with a fast-moving, careless world.

In an attempt to communicate the breadth of his protagonist’s journey, Fincher goes beyond linear storytelling. “Mank” opens with a wounded, alcoholic Mankiewicz (Gary Oldman) bedridden in a cabin surrounded by arid fields. The year is 1940. American film company RKO Pictures has handed Orson Welles a blank check for his new project, and the New York prodigy promptly enlists the help of Mankiewicz, whose sharp tongue and contrarian views have ostracized him from the upper echelons of Hollywood.

From these opening shots, “Mank” travels back in time, gradually uncovering glimpses of the titular protagonist’s fraught past. Stellar performances make possible the ambitious time jumps in the film’s storyline. Equipped with classic glamour and the ghost of a Southern drawl, Amanda Seyfried delivers a convincing portrayal of Marion Davies, an actress whose involvement with newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst (Charles Dance) complicates her enduring friendship with Mankiewicz. Arliss Howard exquisitely embodies the conniving Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer co-founder Louis B. Mayer, whose penchant for faux weeping reveals his manipulative tendencies.

It is impossible to wrest “Mank” from its historical moment. In the 1930s, Hollywood — much like the rest of the nation — buckled under the clash between capitalism and socialism, between a blithe aristocracy and an indignant working class. The Great Depression left the future of film tarnished, confused. This tension crystallized in the 1934 California gubernatorial election between Democrat and author of “The Jungle” Upton Sinclair and Republican candidate Frank Merriam. Incensed by the moral complacency of Mayer and his colleagues, Mankiewicz gambles on the outcome of the election, siding with Sinclair. Film editor Kirk Baxter’s precise manipulation of pace renders Mayer’s election party, which Mankiewicz reluctantly attends, a stunning viewing experience. The time between shots becomes shorter and more erratic, as though mimicking shallow breaths or a quickening heartbeat. A hypnotic montage of champagne, dancing, and shuttering cameras — symbolic of Hollywood elites’ vulgar excess during a time of national destitution — seals Merriam’s victory.

Technically dense sequences like Mayer’s election party are memorable, but the film’s most artful moments lie in glimpses of Mankiewicz's understated vulnerability — a subtlety reinforced by Oldman’s towering performance. As he drafts his script beside secretary Rita Alexander (Lily Collins), an exasperated Mankiewicz bemoans, “None of its sings. None of it. Not a note.” Mankiewicz’s acerbic wit often masks his crippling self-doubt and intermittent suicidal ideation. Occasionally, however, Fincher illuminates his protagonist’s inner agitation. In a brief yet powerful exchange with his brother Joe (Tom Pelphrey), Mankiewicz despairs over his slow progress with his screenplay, to which Joe responds, “It’s the best thing you’ve ever written.” Oldman’s subtle grimace following Joe’s encouragement conveys layers of emotion — melancholy, gratitude, and grief.

At its best, “Mank” is a cohesive amalgam of seeming opposites: excess and destitution, personal ideals and institutional corruption, private grief and public victories. Through this dual focus, Fincher’s film succeeds in depicting a flawed artist’s labored efforts to make sense of his complicated desires — of what he demands of the world and, in turn, what the world demands of him.

—Staff writer Isabella B. Cho can be reached at isabella.cho@thecrimson.com. Follow her on Twitter @izbcho.