Richard Jewell

Grade: A-

A man who does an incredibly heroic act, but ends up getting falsely accused of wrongdoing seems to be a running theme in director Clint Eastwood’s films. A recent example was his Sully, released in 2016. Now Eastwood has a new film out, Richard Jewell, which covers similar territory. I liked Sully. Richard Jewell is even better – one of my favorites of the past year. Its sole Oscar nomination is a much-deserved Best Supporting Actress nod for Kathy Bates, but I’d’ve nominated it for much more.

Was anybody else reading this living in Atlanta, and/or in town when the Olympics were here in 1996? I was. I went to numerous games, and I remember hearing about the bombing in Centennial Olympic Park on July 27. Richard Jewell, the man, was working security that night, and was the first person to discover a suspicious package under a bench. He took it seriously when nobody else would, and tried to help get everybody safely away. Because of him, more people were saved than would have been otherwise. He gets 15 minutes of fame where he is hailed as a hero, and then the tide turns. People start wondering if he had something to do with the bombing, and soon he gets railroaded by the FBI and the media.

In movies, all that ever seems to be on TV is news stories relating to events in the plot, or sometimes characters would see Jay Leno making jokes about it in his opening monologue. I thought filmmakers had grown out of this convention years ago, but there is an unforgivable moment in Richard Jewell where Kathy Bates turns on her TV right on cue, because sure enough, the news is on, and they’re beginning to talk about the Jewell story. They weren’t even in mid-story or mid-sentence.

If that is my biggest issue, the movie is mostly a triumph. Paul Walter Hauser, plays the title character. I had seen him before in I, Tonya and BlacKkKlansman, but this is a breakout performance for him. Hauser, as the 33-year-old (at the time) Jewell, was born in October 1986, which would have made him 9 years old during the ’96 Olympics and the bombing. Looking like John Candy in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, he is a down-home, soft-spoken, straight-laced, honest Southern boy who can’t help but do the right thing. Hauser creates a lovable teddy bear. Kathy Bates plays his mother, still alive and well, though the real-life Jewell sadly passed away of heart failure in 2007. I admire Sam Rockwell more and more each time I see him, and he is spectacular here, as he is in Jojo Rabbit as well. His Oscar win two years ago for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri really put him on the map, even though he has been in the business for a couple decades and change. And though they are not the most likable characters in the world, I enjoyed what Jon Hamm and especially Olivia Wilde brought to the table. A few Atlanta actors and friends of mine were in this too, like the always-stellar Charles Green and Eric Mendenhall (who says probably the film’s most famous line). I loved seeing them.

Like Sully, this is a movie that kept me interested. It made me angry. It was funny. It was touching. It took me back to 15 years old, in the summer of 1996. It skillfully carried me along in this journey, and is a movie I’m going to remember, and will be proud to revisit.

Grade: A-