It’s been five years since Jodi Kantor, Megan Twohey, and Rebecca Corbett broke the story of the true allegations of sexual assault by Harvey Weinstein. Kantor and Twohey eventually wrote a book about their investigation and Rebecca Lenkiewicz has now written a screenplay based on the novel. Maria Schrader helms the film and gets incredible performances from her broad cast. What do all these have in common? They’re incredible women and while She Said follows the revealing of horrific events, it’s more interested in celebrating incredible women doing amazing things. Zoe Kazan and Carey Mulligan star as the elite investigative journalists, Kantor and Twohey, both thriving off of each other as journalists but also as two people. We don’t get introduced to them until after an impressive sequence that follows a young Laura Madden who stumbles upon a production and falls in love with the craft, running down the street in jubilation before we hard cut to her running for her life as tears stream down her face.
It’s powerful moments like the cold open that set us up for the difficult watch the film will be but also the harrowing tone of the film. When we meet Jodi and Megan they’re on other stories and balancing their life at home, Jodi with her two daughters and husband and Megan carrying she and her husbands first child. With their profession, they’re always on the clock, taking any call at any time of the night. This obviously affects their next investigation they take on together as Megan deals with postpartum depression and Jodi has to keep her relationship stable with her journalist husband and taking care of family as she’s the designated traveler between she and Megan. The stakes of hearing stories ties back to them being mothers in a crushing scene as Jodi hears her eldest say “rape” for the first time over FaceTime, and numerous times when they are walking around in New York. There’s tension in their lone walks but there’s certainly a lot more room for those sequences to be explored further and the film overall.
Jodi decides to take on harassment and abuse going on in Hollywood when her editor, Rebecca Corbett (Patricia Clarkson) brings up Rose McGowan’s forthcoming book discussing the abuse she suffered as an actress in the 90s. I’m not sure if this is a screenplay error but Jodi is shocked to learn how pervasive the abuse and system to protect abusers in Hollywood is, which is odd given that we know she’s been an investigative reporter in the film industry. The few contacts that Jodi and Megan have are big names such as Ashley Judd (who plays herself) and Gwyneth Paltrow, but they soon learn of smaller names that are able to produce just as horrifying stories. The various conversations they have range from zoom meetings to low-key conversations in restaurants, to surprise visits. One of the surprise visits where Jodi flies to San Francisco to talk with Rowena Chiu (Angela Yeoh), who’s not home and unfortunately has to hint of her trauma, which he’s never heard of prior.
The emotional toll of these conversations is as good as it should be due to the performances, direction, and editing. There’s absolutely focus on the survivors but this is about Jodi and Megan, so they’re given focus so we can follow the tension of the investigation. Other factors lean into the tension and stakes of these scene due to one of the key survivors, Laura Madden (Jennifer Ehle), going through breast cancer and having four children on her own, or at least that we’re aware of. Her performance is one of the best in the film and her character gives a much needed alternative perspective. However, the best performance of the film is absolutely belongs to Samantha Morton who happens to only be in the film for one scene. Her powerful testimony and the first to present documents propels the film into its second act that unfortunately doesn’t quite live up to what the scene provides.
Schrader does infuse these blandly shot scenes with interesting re-enactments but by only showing images of the rooms and other items with the room. The scariest instance is undoubtedly when a recording of Harvey Weinstein plays as he’s trying to lure an actress into his room. Not much is given to Weinstein’s presence in the film, which is a plus but when he does appear, it’s either through phone calls that Dean Baquet (Andre Braugher) minimizes Harvey in a humorous way while managing to be professional, or when he finally confronts the reporting team with his hulking body being an immensely intimidating presence. Luckily Schrader keeps this as a small part of the film and gives Jodi and Megan the space to do amazing work. What She Said does is showcase amazing work while also keeping a conversation going for an issue that sadly isn’t gone. It’s well acted and told but leaves a lot more to be desired in terms of a film, so do check it out and form your own opinion!
Exploring the Seventh Art 