Blanchett makes 'Veronica Guerin' worth a second look

Friday, October 17, 2003

By WILLIAM ARNOLD
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER MOVIE CRITIC

From the get-go, the gut-wrenching, filmed-in-Ireland, true-life journalism drama, "Veronica Guerin," has a couple of big strikes against its aspiration of becoming one of Hollywood's major year-end critical hits and multi-Oscar contenders.

MOVIE REVIEW

VERONICA GUERIN

DIRECTOR: Joel Schumacher

CAST: Cate Blanchett, Gerard McSorley, Ciaran Hinds

RUNNING TIME: 98 minutes

RATING: R for violence, language and some drug content

WHERE: Bella Bottega 11, East Valley 13, Galleria 11, Grand Cinemas, Guild 45th, Meridian 16

GRADE: B+

For one thing, it tells a story that already has been made into a movie (2000's "When the Sky Falls"). For another, producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Joel Schumacher are highly resented in the industry for the zillions they've made on bloated popcorn movies.

Still, if you can put those prejudices aside, this second biopic of the fearless Dublin reporter who took on the Irish mob in the '90s is a powerful, no-nonsense, well-made engrosser that offers another strong star vehicle for the ever-rising Cate Blanchett.

Opening with Veronica Guerin's drive-by assassination in the mid-'90s, the story is a flashback chronicle of the last two years of her life, when outrage over Dublin's drug epidemic drives her from a lifestyle feature writer to crusading crime reporter.

In the course of the movie, she forms a strange, sexually tinged friendship with one gangster (Ciaran Hinds) and becomes the bitter antagonist of another (Gerard McSorley), and the drama stems largely from the wily cat-and-mouse game she plays with and between them.

An early negative trade review of the film has charged that its Veronica Guerin is not "sympathetic" enough. And it's true that it doesn't present her as Joan of Arc, or even as the single-minded heroine portrayed by the "60 Minutes" segment that made her famous.

But, to me, this seems a strong point of the movie. Its script depicts her as a much more complex woman, and less as the martyred Mother Teresa of the anti-drug movement than an ambitious, often selfish, journalist hooked on the high of a good story.

The film also deserves kudos for showing no trace of the famous over-produced Bruckheimer style, for its clean storytelling line and gritty authenticity, and for its flavorful supporting performances -- especially McSorley, who makes the year's scariest villain.

And, predictably, Blanchett is, warts-and-all, letter perfect. Assuming an Irish brogue that never gets theatrical and never lets down, she powers through this movie with the riveting intensity and aching, poignant credibility of Meryl Streep in her prime.