Richard sits in with CTV NewsChannel anchor Marcia MacMillan to have a look at the birthday blues of “Happy Death Day,” Jackie Chan’s return to adult drama “The Foreigner” and Liam Neeson in the self explanatory “Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down The White House.”
Watch the whole thing HERE!
The name Mark Felt was one of Washington DC’s best-kept secrets for years. From 1972 to 2005 theories and rumours echoed through the halls of power as to the real name of Deep Throat, the pseudonym given to the secret informant who provided information to Bob Woodward that kick started the Watergate scandal. Now that it’s known that the mysterious figure was actually Mark Felt, the Deputy Associate Director of the FBI, how is it possible to make a cloak-and-dagger thriller out of the story when even the name, the lengthy, “Mark Felt – The Man Who Brought Down the White House,” gives away the plot?
The film begins as stone-faced keeper of secrets Felt, played by Liam Neeson, learns his boss of thirty years, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, has died. It is presumed that, given his years of experience and service—he’s the G-man’s G-man—that he’ll be offered the top job. “You’re the chief dragon slayer and keeper of the American dream,” says his wife Audrey (Diane Lane).
His new case looks promising as well. He and his team are investigating a break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington. It’s a case that Felt feels will have major repercussions, perhaps leading to the very top office in the land, President Nixon’s Oval Office.
His dreams of running the F.B.I. and breaking the explosive Watergate case are scuttled when Hoover’s job goes to an assistant attorney general from Nixon’s Justice Department, L. Pat Gray (Marton Csokas). “Hoover is gone,” Felt is told. “You’re alone now holding the end of your own leash.” Felt, once the second in command is now the odd man out. More than that, Gray wants the Watergate investigation shut down. “You are never going to find what you were looking for,” says Gray. “End it. Shut it down.”
Felt knows the burglars are all ex CIA and FBI with connections to the Committee to Re-Elect the President so rather than let it drop he turns to the press and becomes the most famous—and for a time anonymous—whistleblower in American political history.
“Mark Felt – The Man Who Brought Down the White House” is a timely look at the role of the FBI versus the White House. Much of Felt’s dialogue—lines like, “No one can stop the driving force of an FBI investigation. Not even the FBI.”—feel like they could have been lifted from James Comey’s Congressional testimony. The story predates Presidents Ford, Jimmy Carter, two Bushes, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama but feels ripped from today’s headlines.
Déjà vu aside, there isn’t much else here of interest. Neeson is the very model of a company man, someone who gave his life to the FBI only to see outside forces—i.e. Nixon’s White House—compromise the Bureau’s effectiveness. “We don’t answer to them,” he grunts. “The White House has no authority on the FBI.” It’s a compelling reason but Neeson is so stoic he’s barely a character and more a mound of finely sculpted grey hair with an attitude. As Felt he has a very particular set of skills. Skills he has acquired over a very long career. Skills that include stoicism. If you don’t give him what he wants he will hunt you down and tell you secrets.
A grafted on story about his missing, possibly radicalized daughter, does nothing to humanize the man who has spent a career as a cipher and only distracts from the intrigue.
“Mark Felt – The Man Who Brought Down the White House” is based on an explosive story and should be an engaging picture of the backrooms of power and the machinations that brought down a government. Instead it is a talky affair that relies on exposition rather than thrills.
When James Gunn isn’t ripping up the box office with big budget “Guardians of the Galaxy” movies he occasionally let’s his freak flag fly by writing smaller, stranger movies like “The Belko Experiment.” A grisly look at human nature, it’s a riff on the bloody Japanese cult film “Battle Royale” with brains and plenty of brain splatter.
It’s just another day at the office for Belko Industries workers. Housed in a monolithic building outside Bogotá, Columbia city limits, the non-profit company facilitates the hiring of American workers in South America. Today, like every day before, the workers answer phones, drink coffee, talk about their weekends and some even pass the time flirting.
It’s just like any other day except today new security at the front gate sent all the Columbian nationals home. Then an announcement came over the loudspeaker. “There are currently 80 of you in the building,” says a mysterious voice. “By the end of the day many of you will be dead. To survive you must follow instructions. First order: murder any two employees. Doesn’t matter how but there will be repercussions if there aren’t two bodies in half an hour.”
Some think it’s a company wide psychological test, others drift into paranoia. The workers soon learn there’s no place to hide. Surveillance is everywhere and the mysterious voice seems to have tabs on what everyone is doing. With nowhere to hide, nowhere to run panic ensues and the bodies start to pile up.
When a second announcement instructs the workers to kill thirty of the remaining staff it is every man or woman for himself or herself.
Will anyone survive? Will whoever is in charge allow anyone to tell the story of what happened? Well they work together or will they kill one another?
If blood splatter is your thing “The Belko Experiment” may appeal to you. It’s a gory, brain bursting (literally) exercise in nihilism that masquerades as an unfettered social experiment. Which is not to say it isn’t entertaining. For much of its running time it is a compelling cat-and-mouse game but by the time everyone is slipping and sliding on blood soaked floors I was left hoping for a bit more satire or social commentary and a little less sadism and plasma.
Before “The Belko Experiment” becomes all about the blood ‘n brains it does feature some interesting human behaviour by the varied and noteworthy cast. “The Newsroom’s” John Gallagher Jr. is voice of reason Mike who stands in stark contrast to the bloodthirsty survivalists Barry Norris (Tony Goldwin) and Wendell Dukes (“Office Space’s” John C. McGinley). A study in how far people will go to stay alive, it doesn’t offer many surprising answers—here’s a shocker, people will do almost anything not to be killed—but at a lean 89 minutes it’s brutally entertaining.
