Review: "She Said"

Maria Schrader's journalism drama about the investigation into Harvey Weinstein is a gripping tale.

She Said (Dir. Maria Schrader)

Has the period-piece journalism drama now become an Oscar-bait staple? Two of these films in seven years have competed for the Best Picture award: Tom McCarthy’s Spotlight took it home in 2015, while Steven Spielberg’s The Post received a nomination in 2017. With their tonal gravitas and hot-topic subject matter, these films found awards success in depicting how major newspapers uncovered some of our most era-defining controversies, and by taking cues from Alan Pakula’s All the President’s Men—the high bar for thrillers about investigative journalism.

Timelier than both Spotlight and The Post but no less awards-oriented, She Said is this season’s journalism thriller entry into the Oscars race, with all requisite trappings in tow. Carey Mulligan and Zoe Kazan star as New York Times reporters Megan Twohey and Jodi Kantor, the duo who uncovered Harvey Weinstein’s previously unknown history of sexual abuse; the film is also adapted from Twohey and Kantor’s own book on the subject. With a $32 million budget contributing to a majestic score by Nicholas Britell and on-location shooting within the Times building itself, She Said is a potent cinematic brew—one that nevertheless finds itself lost in the minutiae of investigative reporting.

The film opens in 2015, during the run-up to the election of Donald Trump, with Twohey asking a woman who has been victimized by the President-elect to go on the record about her experience. When she finally persuades her to do so, the backlash is immediate: Both Twohey and her interviewee are bombarded with news reporters and threatening phone calls. This sequence illuminates the harsh climate under which women must navigate when confronted with abuse, then becoming the film’s thematic groundwork. Maria Schrader, who directs the film, presents these scenes with a disarming bluntness, as when Twohey receives a vile phone call threatening rape. The scene lands with the terror it requires.

From here, She Said transitions seamlessly into the Weinstein investigation, detailing not only the arduousness of the reporting but also the domestic lives of the journalists themselves. Away from the Times, Twohey and Kantor are wives and mothers; Schrader and screenwriter Rebecca Lenkiewicz do an admirable job balancing the investigation with their home worlds. There are frank scenes in which Twohey confesses symptoms of postpartum depression to her husband, where Kantor has to explain the implication of the word “rape” to her pre-teen daughter. These moments, among the best in the film, pulsate with an emotional realism that help She Said stand apart from its predecessors.

Mulligan and Kazan are excellent as Twohey and Kantor, with detailed performances that reveal distinct journalistic personalities. As Twohey, Mulligan commands a room with certitude and poise, while Kazan plays Kantor with patience and sincerity. (Costume designer Brittany Loar translates these sentiments brilliantly into their apparel: Twohey sports shades and casual pantsuits, Kantor wears dresses with a homelier charm.) Other standout performances include the stalwart Samantha Morton and Jennifer Ehle, both of whom play ex-employees of Weinstein with various degrees of traumas. Andre Braugher, of Brooklyn Nine-Nine fame, gives a commanding turn as Times editor Dean Baquet.

Despite the film’s impressive characterization, She Said often finds itself relishing in its investigation to the point of redundance. There are countless details in a story this size, especially as the investigation begins globe-trotting from New York to Silicon Valley to the UK in its pursuit of the truth. The sheer amount of reporting that must be done to reach the film’s conclusion is too much for the film’s 129-minute runtime, leading She Said to feel more bogged-down than it deserves. (The film’s various flashback sequences, depicting the lives of three of Weinstein’s victims, also contribute to a feeling of bloatedness.)

Still, She Said is an absorbing tale, a gripping journalism drama that splits the difference between Spotlight’s patient realism and The Post’s Spielbergian righteousness. Being that it deals with more recent history—most of us already know the extent Weinstein’s abuses—She Said’s task is somewhat different than its predecessors. “It’s hard to ask women to talk,” remarks Twohey at one point in the film, suggesting the difficulties women face speaking up in the workplace. She Said likewise performs its own journalistic duty, showing just how difficult it is to reveal such a scandal in the first place. —James Fahey