The Post (2017, Dir. Steven Spielberg):
In the First Amendment the Founding Fathers gave the free press the protection it must have to fulfill its essential role in our democracy. The press was to serve the governed, not the governors.
— Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, 1971
I was really depressed about the way things were happening in the world and in the country. And Liz Hannah, 31 years old, writes a spec script, gets it to Amy Pascal, who sends it to me, and suddenly my entire outlook on the future brightens. Our intended audience [is] the people who have spent basically the last 13, 14 months thirsting and starving for the truth.
— Steven Spielberg, 2017
Much time in Steven Spielberg’s The Post is devoted to observing the nuts and bolts of the printing process: deadline-driven editors furiously scribbling edits over copy, linotype machines clacking away, finished newspapers spat out through rollers, with all involved well aware that whatever is printed cannot be taken back easily (or at least, not until errata are noted in the next edition, at much cost to integrity and reputation). Things have changed in the Internet age, and an error can now be deleted with a few keystrokes, but the urgency for the latest scoops remains, be that news good, bad, fake or indifferent.
The more things change, the more they stay the same: as we find ourselves in yet another age in which the war between the politically powerful and the press rages on, Spielberg clearly feels the need to comment on the situation, and he does so through the prism of the past. The Post begins in 1966 during the tumult of the Vietnam War, as researcher Daniel Ellsberg (Matthew Rhys, no stranger to skulduggery himself from The Americans TV series) gets an up-close-and-personal look at the horrors of the conflict. When Ellsberg’s reports about American progress (in short: not good) are accepted and then pointedly ignored by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (Bruce Greenwood), he decides to take matters into his own hands, and absconds with what will become known as the Pentagon Papers. So far, so sneaky, and these early scenes play out with the hushed urgency of a Cold War thriller.
But then we flash forward five years, landing smack in the life of Katharine “Kay” Graham (Meryl Streep), the patrician owner of The Washington Post. Ready to take the newspaper she inherited from her late husband public, Graham’s headaches include a bunch of cranky editors she may have to lay off, a board of directors who are none too sanguine about the “local paper”‘s viability, and a sagging bottom line. Never mind the goings-on in Vietnam — for beleaguered editor-in-chief Ben Bradlee (Tom Hanks) and crew, the most critical news item of the week is gaining access to the wedding of Dick Nixon’s daughter. A woman operating in a man’s world — while the men discuss politics, she and her girlfriends prattle on about Laurence Durrell’s latest ex-wife — Graham isn’t convinced that such salacious stuff is the way forward. “Are you sure we’re setting the right tone, Ben?” she asks him decorously over lunch; he tells her in his usual gruff, half-charming manner to mind her own business.
And then the little local paper finds itself riding atop the tidal wave of history, as the Pentagon Papers surface with the New York Times. When the flagship newspaper threatens to print them, the White House puts a stop to it with an injunction, which lands the hot potato right in the lap of The Post, who has also acquired the papers through intrepid editor Ben Bagdikian (Bob Odenkirk). Does The Post print the Pentagon Papers and risk a lawsuit from the U.S. government, which would effectively bankrupt the paper? Bradlee, ever the champion of a free press (and salivating at the chance to catapult his paper into the national ranks) has no qualms about it: “The only way to assert the right to publish is to publish,” he insists. Graham’s lawyers, including her confidant Fritz (wry Tracy Letts), want the paper to play it safe, and live to fight another day. The decision ultimately rests with Graham, who’s used to hobnobbing with Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson, and is on first-name terms with “Bob” McNamara. Will she sacrifice friendships on the altar of the truth, and risk the dissolution of her beloved newspaper? For once, a woman has the power to alter the course of history.
It’s easy to see why The Post appealed to Spielberg — it focuses on likable heroes who are a bit out of their depth, and celebrates their defiance of a stodgy establishment. (Odenkirk is particularly convincing as the rumpled, sensible Bagdikian.) The film’s quick genesis (it was assembled in under eight months) seems to have energized him; you won’t find much of the preciousness that has often dogged his previous “prestige” productions here. Simple and supple, The Post is light on its feet even as it tackles the big questions. It helps when Spielberg has actors like Streep and Hanks to hold the frame. Hanks overdoes it a bit on the bluster — his Ben Bradlee would be more at home in His Girl Friday than in the cynical seventies — but his movie-star turn is wily and entertaining. Streep goes the opposite direction, underplaying Graham to memorable effect. Accustomed to not being the center of attention, she’s fluttery and fidgety, and yet she misses nothing. The character may be fussy, but Streep’s performance is anything but.
“We have to be the check on their power. If we don’t hold them accountable, who will?”
– Ben Bradlee
The film finds its rhythm whenever it lets the repartee flow between its two stars. “So, can I ask you a hypothetical question?” Bradlee asks. “Oh, dear,” says Graham, “I don’t like hypothetical questions.” “Well, I don’t think you’re gonna like the real one, either,” he replies. Ultimately the story boils down to a decision about doing the right thing, and Spielberg dramatizes the dilemma through a five-way phone conversation that is as sprightly as anything he’s pulled off in years. The film’s climactic moment is handled with rare subtlety as well, as it is revealed that other national newspapers have followed The Post’s lead. “I’ve always wanted to be part of a revolution,” smirks Bagdikian, and at its best The Post reignites the idea that regular, hard-working joes and janes can make as much of a difference as the corrupt folks in power.
Which is not to say that The Post is perfect. The film also wants to give Graham her due as a trailblazing female pioneer, which is a noble goal, but the script devolves into Hollywood cliches to get the point across. It’s hard to buy scenes such as the one in which a female assistant in employ of the U.S. Attorney General (who intends to bring Graham down in court) basically tells Graham to give her male bosses hell. Streep must deliver a big monologue about how hard it is as a woman to do what she does, replete with swelling strings and a teary close-up, while Bradlee’s wife Tony (Sarah Paulson) reminds him (and the audience) over dinner how tough women have it in the world of men: “To them, you’re not even there.” The commentary makes sense in today’s more enlightened climate; in the film, it’s badly off-key, considering the era in which the story takes place. Spielberg remains fundamentally incapable of sticking the landing in his films: a final image of Graham walking out of the Supreme Court, unnoticed, while reporters crowd around the male lawyers is a fine, understated capper of a moment, but then Spielberg can’t resist showing Graham walking past a row of beatific young women who are awestruck and inspired by her very presence (never mind that Graham was such an invisible figure at the time that she’s not even mentioned in the film of All the President’s Men, which took place a few years after the Pentagon Papers affair). Convincing when it comes to the moral issues at play, the film is less so when it comes to presenting a credible representation of Katharine Graham as Wonder Woman. Thank goodness Streep is around to make heroism seem less like grandstanding and more like a personal imperative. She gets the last word, and it’s a good one. “We should just keep at it,” she says, unaware that Watergate is just around the corner. As Spielberg demonstrates throughout The Post, the lessons of the past remain valid in the present, and we must be prepared when history circles around once again.
