It's hard to figure out if this movie was written first and then they cast actor Christian McKay as Welles, or if they looked at McKay and constructed a Welles movie with him in mind. Either way, his resemblance to the young Welles is uncanny and stunning (his resemblance to John Lithgow is also pretty close - so I guess he would have the lead in that biopic as well!). Other than the casting choices, there is not much going on in the movie.
The story is about a high school kid in suburban New York who cuts school and gets a role in the famous Welles-Mercury Theater production of Julius Caesar. That production remains today a grand historical achievement setting the Shakespearean history in fascist Italy. Along the way, the boy, played by teeny heart-throb Zac Efron falls in love with Claire Danes, an assistant in the theater company and gets bent out of shape when Welles seduces her. Danes is still gorgeous and shows herself here to be very good - it's a shame she doesn't work more.
One of the most fun elements of the movie is seeing some of the famous actors of the Mercury Theater. Oh - look there - it's Joseph Cotten; Oh - there's George Coulouris; Hey - there's John Houseman. Overall, the actors cast here look a tremendous amount like the real people they're playing. But that's about all we get from the film. The main point of intrigue, which only comes in around the middle of the third act, isn't all that interesting. It's great to see how the theatrical production came to fruition - but most of what we see is Welles behaving badly and still being a genius (of course he could behave badly because he was a genius - because he had a world class ego and because he knew he was talented enough to get the job done in the end). That's not all that interesting.
One very curious thing is that one of the big points of tension in the story is Welles' belittling treatment of Efron's character. Strangely, nobody ever makes a comment that in 1937 Welles himself was only 22 - only four or five years older than Efron's character. This is very strange, of course, because the whole point of the movie is that Welles is a genius. In this film there is no comment on Welles' age - and he comes off as a man in his mid- to late-30s. There could easily have been a line, like: 'Wow-Welles is so talented and so young!' (This is where everybody over 27 should feel shame that they didn't make one of the greatest films of all-time by that age!)
I generally think director Richard Linklater is an interesting director (though I certainly don't love all his movies). This film, however, feels especially anonymous and almost Disney-Channel-esque (and not just because of Efron). It feels very amateurish and superficial. Like a glossy history of a bygone era, with almost no grit and no psychology to speak of.
Stars: 1.5 of 4
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