Gretchen Carlson (Nicole Kidman) has had enough. After years of being derided, dismissed, and demoted for being an older woman in Fox News, she drops a bombshell: Roger Ailes (John Lithgow), CEO of Fox, sexually harassed her for years. Thus begins a chain of events that would end up taking down one of the most powerful men in American media. As Carlson falls, a minor staffer in her employ, the gorgeous Kayla (Margot Robbie) begins to rise, thanks to the… special attention of Ailes. This would–
Wait, if that’s the case, why does it start with Megyn Kelly (Charlize Theron)? Why was Megyn’s long wait before she made a decision about supporting Ailes or testifying about her own harassment at her hands the focal point of the entire middle of the film? Hold on, is Megyn Kelly the main character of this movie? Why? Kelly is easily more famous than Carlson, sure, and Kayla isn’t even a real person. Is that enough? She has easily the least interesting story of the three women. Does the gravity well that is Megyn Kelly’s fame and Charlize Theron’s charisma pull the whole movie off kilter?
Yes. Absolutely. Unquestionably.
“Wait, am I going to be the story? I’m going to be the story.”
You might think that Gretchen Carlson would be the main character. She has a natural arc, watching Ailes promote younger, more pliable women as he slowly boxes her out, pushing her to launch the groundbreaking sexual harassment lawsuit the story is about. Kayla, still a problematic character, would at least make more sense as both a clear narrative foil to Carlson and as a symbol of the way an environment like this will grind up talented young women. Also, you know, Gretchen is the one doing stuff.
But Megyn Kelly is absolutely the focal point of the film. She even gets the signature Big Short-style “talk at the viewers to explain a complex topic” bit at the opening of the film. Except, of course, she isn’t trying to explain credit swap tranches; she’s trying to explain that Fox News might – might – be *gasp* problematic. (This idea is reiterated like 20 minutes later within the narrative, so… glad we spent time on that.) Indeed, I would argue that the main story of Bombshell is about Megyn Kelly trying to decide whether or not she will come forward about her own abuse or support Roger.
If you’re wondering: No, watching her go back and forth about this is not the most exciting thing in the world, no matter how exacting Theron’s impression of Kelly is. Writer Charles Randolph and director Jay Roach open the movie with a lot of narration, but they stop it just when you wish it kept going. What’s going on in Kelly’s head as she watches this decades-old scandal resurface? Is there shame? Anger? A recognition of the system to which she contributed? It’s a great impression, but it isn’t an insightful performance. Then again, she wasn’t exactly given much to work with.
“I think I’d be freakin’ phenomenal on your network.”
Let’s talk about Kayla. Carlson and Kelly are based on real people, and presumably the broad strokes of their arcs are pulled from real testimony. Kayla, the bisexual Evangelical millennial schemer, is not. Or, more accurately, Kayla is a combination of many different people. Unfortunately, Kayla also has the most explosive story in the movie. Ailes’ abuse against Kayla is the most physical, and it goes the furthest. But, again, Kayla is not a real person, so she has the least interiority in the script.
For instance: Kelly and Carlson both have a home life, a history, and, inexplicably, random narration that largely vanishes about twenty minutes in. Kayla does not. Kayla has a confusing but shockingly powerful relationship with a liberal lesbian Bill O’Reilly producer (also not real, I think), but they don’t have, you know, families. They have a lot of character traits, but that’s because they feel like characters, in the sense that there could be a USA network (Characters Welcome™) show about them.
Margot Robbie isn’t bad. Indeed, she gives a pretty great performance, aptly capturing the confusion, shame, and humiliation of her situation without having to filter it through an impression. Hell, the film’s three best scenes all center Kayla, and they’re all queasily powerful in different ways. But her character feels… wrong.Is she a knowing, confident careerist climber, or a naive sweetheart who needs a guided tour of what Fox News is despite having worked there for a year? Kayla is meant to link Kelly, Carlson, Ailes, and O’Reilly, to serve as a narrative bridge between Roger’s (and Bill’s) abuse, Carlson’s lawsuit, and Kelly’s investigation. But she doesn’t feel real. And that’s a problem, because when Carlson inexplicably vanishes from the film for a solid hour and Kelly dithers, Kayla is the story.
“Someone has to speak up. Someone has to get mad.”
Early in Bombshell, Gretchen Carlson is asked if other women will come forward. She replies with the line above. It’s a decent line, and Nicole Kidman delivers it well. But this isn’t a movie about ‘getting mad’. This is a movie about feeling good. This is a movie about flattening a group of monstrous women into pleasant, pop-feminist icons of #resistance against the patriarchy. Did they contribute to the mainstreaming of vehement racism and xenophobia? Sure. Did they help elect Donald Trump? Unquestionably. Did they create the most toxic media environment imaginable? Yup.
But Bombshell won’t – can’t – handle that. It teases it here and there. The ending practically begs for someone to come to that realization. But no. Instead, we get an inspirational bit of feel-good White Feminism (but don’t call it feminism, Kelly is quick to remind everyone), and then we’re off to a profoundly misguided credits song. Superficially, Bombshell has a lot in common with The Big Short, but it completely lacks the righteous rage of McKay’s financial crisis drama. McKay understood that these characters needed to be seen as outsiders in order to be relatable. Director Jay Roach misses that here, content to try to paint the ultimate insiders as kindly but ambitious family women with staggering power who just oopsie-stumbled into promoting fascism.
So, yeah, Gretchen, I agree. Someone has to get mad. But none of the women in this movie really do. It’s a surprisingly bloodless revolution. And maybe that’s because, in the end, nothing actually changed.
Bombshell is out now in theaters everywhere. Written by Charles Randolph and directed by Jay Roach, Bombshell stars Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman, and Margot Robbie.