The New Yorker - USA (2020-11-23)

76 THENEWYORKER,NOVEMBER23, 2020

THE CURRENTCINEMA

THE MARK OF KANE

“Mank.”

BY ANTHONYLANE

ILLUSTRATION BY BILL BRAGG

A

s the film critic Donald Trump
once pointed out, “There was a
great rise in ‘Citizen Kane,’ and there
was a modest fall. The fall wasn’t a finan-
cial fall. The fall was a personal fall. But
it was a fall nevertheless.” Wise words,
equally applicable to Humpty Dumpty.
Risings and fallings abound in David
Fincher’s new movie, “Mank,” which

was written by his late father, Jack
Fincher, and is largely about the cre-
ation of “Citizen Kane” (1941). The title
refers to Herman J. Mankiewicz, who
is credited, at the end of “Citizen Kane,”
as the co-author of the screenplay, to-
gether with a guy named Orson Welles.
Their work was honored with an Acad-
emy Award—the only Oscar that the
film received. Neither man showed up
for the ceremony, in 1942, at the Bilt-
more Hotel, where, it is said, every men-
tion of “Citizen Kane” was jeered.
Mankiewicz, who worked for this
magazine in its infancy, before eloping
west, was one of those people who are
so deeply rooted in their era that you
can’t imagine them living at any other
time. He looked like a highly amused

potato. Trying to think of something

that he didn’t laugh at is a thankless task.

(There is a photograph of him dressed

up as Groucho, Chico, and Harpo Marx

simultaneously.) His mug was round and

knobbly; his mouth was wide and fully

occupied, with booze going in and a gur-

gle of words flowing out. He was a gam-

bler, too. On one occasion, according to

“Mank,” he bet five thousand bucks on

the fall of a leaf. So, who should play

him onscreen? W. C. Fields could have

done it, long ago, on condition that the

props department supplied real alcohol,

not some filthy aqueous substitute.

Charles Durning would have been ideal.

Oliver Platt, perhaps, might fit the bill.

In the event, Fincher plumps for Gary

Oldman, who, after triumphing as Win-

ston Churchill, in “Darkest Hour” (2017),

is no stranger to men of whopping ap-

petites and liquor-boosted wit.

“Mank” pays tribute to “Citizen Kane”

in aspects great and small. The snow

globe, slipping from the hand of the

dying Kane at the outset of Welles’s film,

is nicely echoed by Fincher with a closeup

of an empty bottle, tumbling from his

hero’s grasp. Both films are in black and

white, and both are chronologically rest-

less, dancing to and fro from year to year.

We start in 1940, with Mankiewicz en

route to Victorville, an hour or two from

Los Angeles. He has a leg in plaster and

a mission to fulfill. At a lonely ranch,

with a secretary, Rita Alexander (Lily

Collins), to take dictation and to keep

him off the sauce, he must generate a

script for Welles’s début film. John

Houseman (Sam Troughton), Welles’s

theatrical comrade, will oversee the prog-

ress of the plan. (Troughton plays him

as a fusspot, with diction to match: “We’re

expecting grrreat things,” “We’re at a

Rrrubicon moment.” Was Houseman

quite as prim as that?) Now the flashbacks

kick in. One presents us with the car

crash that injured Mankiewicz; another

spirits us to 1930, with the writer Charles

Lederer arriving at Paramount Studios.

He bears an alluring telegram from

Mankiewicz, informing him, “There are

millions to be made and your only com-

petition is idiots.”

There was such a telegram, although,

in truth, it was sent to Ben Hecht. “Mank”

does a lot of this—polishing old show-

biz myths and rearranging them on the

mantelpiece. Thus, the well-worn line

about using Western Union, rather than

a movie, if you need to send a message

is randomly assigned to Louis B. Mayer

(Arliss Howard), the lord of M-G-M.

Similarly, every Mankiewicz fan has

heard about his vomiting at dinner, apol-

ogizing to his host, and explaining that

it’s O.K., because the white wine came

up with the fish; but where did the gag

occur? Fincher places it at San Simeon,

the plush stronghold of William Ran-

dolph Hearst (Charles Dance, in excel-

lent fettle), where Mankiewicz was often

invited, in the nineteen-thirties. There,

once more in flashback, we watch him,

in his capacity as court jester, diverting

and offending the other guests.

He becomes a particular pal of

Hearst’s long-suffering companion,

the actress Marion Davies (Amanda

Seyfried), whom we first encounter as

she stands atop a pyramid of wood,

with the cameras about to roll, ready

for her immolation. “What’s at stake

here?” Mankiewicz inquires. Later, he

and Davies take a moonlit stroll, among

the statues and the private menager-

ies. “Now, that’s sticking the old neck

Gary Oldman plays the writer Herman J. Mankiewicz in David Fincher’s film.