THENEWYORKER,SEPTEMBER30, 2019 87
NEWYORKER.COM
Richard Brody blogs about movies.one hoping to grasp these tangled issues
should probably go for “The Panama
Papers,” Alex Winter’s documentary of
2018, and skip “The Laundromat,” whose
mission is not to enlighten us so much
as to revel in the flagrancy of the mis-
chief that it purports to condemn. For
one thing, so thoroughly do Banderas
and Oldman enjoy themselves that it
feels almost ungracious to decry their
cynical rapacity; at one delicious meta-
moment, they even disclose that “the di-
rector of this movie” has invested in five
shell companies. Nobody is safe.
There is nothing new, of course, about
villains hogging the spotlight. That is
their domain. Why, then, should “The
Laundromat” induce such particular
queasiness? Partly because of Meryl
Streep, who shows us what might have
been. As Ellen, she is a marvel; few other
performers can give such a plausible,
affecting, and unpatronizing account of
a regular citizen, tethered by stable val-
ues and fond memories. (“He took me
to see Diana Ross at Caesar’s,” she says
of her husband.) I’d say that Ellen mer-
its a movie to herself, instead of which
she is constantly interrupted, and we
get the fatal sense that Soderbergh is a
trifle impatient with her normality—
that he doesn’t back her as he backed
Julia Roberts in the cleaner, more de-
termined story line of “Erin Brockovich.”
More awkward still is his treatment
of Mia Beltran (Brenda Zamora), whose
signature, on thousands of documents,
suggests that she is a company director
of some stature. But no, she is a lowly
employee of a Panamanian firm, who
does what she is told and would be hor-
rified to hear that she is part of a world-
wide criminal conspiracy. Mia is a frag-
ment of the shell. We see her taking the
bus home one afternoon, and then fall-
ing afoul of a freak accident, which So-
derbergh has the nerve to play for laughs.
Hang on, what ever happened to “The
Meek Are Screwed”? How can a para-
ble that set out to take the side of little
people, versus gargantuan greed, end up
using them as disposable comic fodder?
Not only shall the meek not inherit the
Earth. They don’t even own the movie.I
f you were watching PBS on Septem-
ber 17, 1974, you might have come
across “Guest of Honor.” This was an
episode from the second series of “Up-
stairs, Downstairs,” one of the decade’s
most successful shows—a British enter-
prise, set in a stately London house, in
the years before and after the First World
War. The drama was divided, as the title
implies, between the grandees in the
upper rooms and the crew of loyal ser-
vants who, from their base of operations
down below, saw to their employers’ every
need. In “Guest of Honor,” matters were
complicated by the visit of the King,
who came to dine: a privilege, a challenge,
or an imposition, according to taste.
Now we have “Downton Abbey,”
which is written by Julian Fellowes, di-
rected by Michael Engler, and stoutly
based on the TV phenomenon of the
same name. The film is set in a stately
country house, in 1927, and the drama is
divided. Upstairs, we find Lord Grantham
(Hugh Bonneville), his wife, Cora (Eliz-
abeth McGovern), and their daughters,
Lady Mary (Michelle Dockery) and
Lady Edith (Laura Carmichael), both
of whom, I must confess, lead me to
wonder if Lenin had a point, after all.
Also present is the Earl’s redoubtablemother (Maggie Smith), who dispenses
bons mots like sour lemon drops. Down-
stairs, there is Barrow the butler (Robert
James-Collier), Mrs. Patmore the cook
(Lesley Nicol), her assistant Daisy (So-
phie McShera), the benevolent Bates
(Brendan Coyle), and his wife, Anna ( Jo-
anne Froggatt), who is also Lady Mary’s
maid. And the main event? The visit of
the King (Simon Jones), who comes to
dine: a privilege, and all that jazz.
What, you may ask, distinguishes
“Downton Abbey” on the big screen
from its smaller kin? Well, the movie
is twice as long, and, when the house-
keeper, Mrs. Hughes (Phyllis Logan),
instructs the staff, in her brisk Highland
manner, to make everything “gleam and
spaarrkle,” she could be speaking for
the whole production. From the steam
train at the start, and the mail van that
brings a letter from Buckingham Pal-
ace, to the silver that requires one last
buffing before the feast, everything looks
hilariously spruce, and the scene in
which Mrs. Patmore tips blood-red
sauce onto the stiff white waistcoat of
Mr. Wilson (David Haig), His Majes-
ty’s impregnable butler, is as shocking
as the climax of “Reservoir Dogs.” Now
and then, it is true, we are titillated with
subplots: The foiled assassination! The
purloined paper knife! The broken
boiler! And, yes, the gay club! In York-
shire! But all vexations are calmed, and
“Downton Abbey” concludes with both
Lady Edith and Daisy uttering the sa-
cred words “I’m happy.” Upstairs and
downstairs, in perfect concord: believe
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