Year 14, Day 151 - 5/31/22 - Movie #4,154
BEFORE: OK, last film in May, 31 films watched in May, that's fine, one per day, and I'm right where I want to be, heading into June, Father's Day and then July 4 coming up. My post-holiday weekend work schedule is absolutely crazy, I don't know how I'm going to work at so many screenings and festivals and still have time to watch movies, but I'm going to try. I may have to just sleep in July...
Here's the screening format breakdown for all of May's films:
1 watched on YouTube: Jupiter Ascending
2 watched on Disney+: Jungle Cruise, Artemis Fowl
1 watched on Tubi: Miss Sloane
Gugu Mbatha-Raw carries over from "Jupiter Ascending" - I separated this Jessica Chastain film from the others I watched in May just because I needed it here, to make the connection to the first film in June, and in the same manner, I've got another film with Gugu Mbatha-Raw in it on my list, but I'm going to need THAT one after the Summer Concert Rock & Doc Block, to make a different connection in August so I can move forward then.
THE PLOT: In the high-stakes world of political power-brokers, Elizabeth Sloane is the most sought after and formidable lobbyist in D.C. But when taking on the most powerful opponent of her career, she finds winning may come at too high a price.
AFTER: I had my reasons for separating this Jessica Chastain film from the rest of the herd - I was thinking big picture-style, doing this sort of thing makes the overall chain possible, and it allows me to land the right films on those benchmark holidays. If I was very rigid and OCD about it, and I insisted on watching all the Jessica Chastain films together, then it's most likely that the linking possibilities just wouldn't be there when I need them - so I can organize all of my films by actor, but I also need to be flexible about it, and move some of them around when necessary.
So this boring (I assumed) film about lobbyists was just sitting there at the end of the month (after I flipped the war movie section of my chain around), waiting for me, being boring. Look, there are worse things than watching a boring film, at the very least a boring film gets me closer to a less-boring film the next day, or the next week. So I don't mind, I'll watch any boring film just to get it off my list. But then I realized this 2016 film is about lobbyists fighting for, and against, gun control legislation. WHOA, suddenly this film, regrettably of course, just became super relevant, given the news from last week. Then this film caught my attention, because it's exactly what some people think MIGHT finally happen, after the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
I'd love to see that happen - but people thought there might be some legislation in the U.S. after Parkland, and it didn't happen. Awareness was raised, people expressed opinions, a lot of people talked about what SHOULD be done after the shootings at Stoneman Douglas High in 2018, and the Sandy Hook shootings in Newtown, Connecticut in 2012, but nothing really constructive was done, nothing changed, and then in 2022, we've had the school shooting in Uvalde, and a mass shooting in a Buffalo supermarket before that. There were a DOZEN mass shootings in the U.S. just this past weekend, and 214 in the U.S. so far this year - and we're only on Day 151. What the hell is going on?
I know, there are no easy answers - or are there? Guns are easy to get in the U.S., so more people have them, therefore more people use them. That seems pretty simple, but true things sometimes seem simple. There are crazy people out there, sure, that's one part of it, plus everyone's coming out of the pandemic, they want to get out there and party and shop and go to concerts again - but why can't we do all that without people getting shot? One of the best (only good) things I can say about the pandemic is that school shootings were way down, because kids were learning from home. Now we've just started to try and get back to normal schooling, and all this has to happen? Why couldn't we phase in the good things about society, like going out to restaurants and state fairs and concerts and movies and not bring back the bad things, like people getting killed while grocery shopping?
You can probably tell where I stand on this issue - I've never owned a gun, never shot a (real) gun, never gone hunting, never fought in a war, and I've made it 53 years without killing anybody, though Lord knows there may have been times when it crossed my mind. Yeah, I had a religious background, and that might be part of it, but there are plenty of God-fearing Christians out there who also own guns and DO have the capacity to kill, so I don't think there's a direct relationship there. It just doesn't appeal to me, any part of the gun culture or the hunting/camping/killing animals lifestyle. Anything larger than a bug, and I'm inclined to let it live. Yes, I eat meat so I know that maybe makes me a hypocrite, but that's just where I draw that line.
Anyway, this film is about Elizabeth Sloane, a female lobbyist who is tasked by her firm to work on leading the effort to oppose legislation that would expand background checks on guns. If I've got a NITPICK POINT here, the way that the person representing the gun manufacturers approached the lobbying firm, it seemed more like the way someone would make a pitch to an advertising firm, and I'm not sure those two things are the same. But I know very little about lobbyists, so I have to let it slide. The gun companies want to turn public opinion against the bill by targeting female voters, getting moms against gun control. Sloane is personally against the idea, and when she gets an offer from a rival lobbying firm to do the opposite, she takes the offer and brings key members of her staff over to her new firm.
They do one of those visual bulletin board things where they put photos of all the senators they know are FOR the bill on one board, all the senators AGAINST on another board, and all the undecided ones on the board in the middle, then count how many votes they need to secure to get the legislation passed - thank God for visual aids or we lowly movie-viewers wouldn't be able to understand when progress is being made.
Sloane is willing to use every weapon in her arsenal (sorry, poor use of that metaphor) to change public opinion, she sets up phony audience members at campaign dinners to sandbag senators with questions on gun control, and she agrees to debate her own boss on TV over the Constitutionality of gun control and/or the 2nd Amendment. If anyone says that the Constitution can't be changed, that's a hollow argument, because we have amendments - everything in the Bill of Rights is an amendment, a necessary change made to the original. That document is a living, evolving thing - and it was written during a different time in history, you have to acknowledge that. In 1789 they didn't have automatic weapons, or safe abortions for that matter - so we can't just live our lives as if nothing has changed since Colonial times. The constitution they wrote back then was the one they needed, but as time went on, the country's needs changed, so the document had to change too.
Sloane also learns that one of her co-workers at the new firm was the survivor of a school shooting years ago, and has dedicated her life to working towards stricter gun laws. Sloane works subtly (at first) to get her more TV appearances, makes her the face of the campaign, then outs her as a shooting survivor on live TV. It's a bold move, but one that also treats this staff member like just another pawn in the game, which is unfortunate. It also exposes that staff member to violent threats, people who maybe want to finish what the original shooter didn't - it's at this point that the film falls back on the metaphor that the only thing that can stop a bad person with a gun is a good person with a gun, and it's too bad that's an argument used by the pro-gun lobbyists all the time.
Sloane's not a perfect person, she visits male escorts and takes some kind of drug, possibly speed, to avoid sleep, or help her sleep, or maintain her busy schedule, it's tough to say which. Maybe all three. She's also prone to reaction, and willing to cut corners and break the rules, but then again, she's also always three steps ahead of her competition, so there's that. I won't give away any more of the plot, except to say that maybe in 2016 America wasn't yet ready for background checks and any form of gun control. Is the country ready now? I guess we're going to find out in the weeks to come.
Also starring Jessica Chastain (last seen in "Ava"), Mark Strong (last seen in "Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day"), Alison Pill (last seen in "Vice" (2018)), Michael Stuhlbarg (last seen in "Shirley"), Sam Waterston (last seen in "On the Basis of Sex"), John Lithgow (last seen in "The Tomorrow Man"), David Wilson Barnes (last seen in "The Company Men"), Jake Lacy (last seen in "Being The Ricardos"), Raoul Bhaneja (last seen in "The Sentinel"), Chuck Shamata (ditto), Douglas Smith (last seen in "Terminator Genisys"), Meghann Fahy,Grace Lynn Kung (last seen in "Fahrenheit 451" (2018)), Al Mukadam (last seen in "Kodachrome"), Noah Robbins (last seen in "Tick, Tick...BOOM!"), Lucy Owen, Sergio Di Zio (last seen in "The Boondock Saints"), Joe Pingue (ditto), Michael Cram, Dylan Baker (last seen in "Let's Go to Prison"), Zach Smadu, Austin Strugnell (last seen in "K-19: The Widowmaker"), Alexandra Castillo, Jack Murray (last seen in "The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio"), Christine Baranski (last seen in "The Bounty Hunter"), Aaron Hale, Greta Oneiogou, Kyle Mac, Ennis Esmer, Angela Vint (last seen in "Shimmer Lake"), Kevin Jubinville, Anand Rajaram, Rick Roberts (last seen in "Man of the Year"), Murray Furrow, Courtenay Stevens (last seen in "Breach"), Craig Eldridge (ditto), Doug Murray (last seen in "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days").
RATING: 5 out of 10 ethics violations
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