Yesssssss!!! I used to be a tour guide at WB and loooved talking about Marion Davies. She contributed so much to the construction of the Warner Bros Studio lot in Burbank. Her's and Betty Davis' bungalows are still utilized on the lot, and she's also the reason why WB built an enormous soundstage with a water tank in it. I don't remember if the tank was added during or after production of Cain and Mabel, but it's nice just to see Marion Davies get some attention. :)
It's actually a common thing for people with a stutter to get into theater because memorizing lines and repeating them is shown to help. It might be because each word is a known quantity which is less pressure than speaking off the cuff.
I have a stammer. For me, the opposite happens. There are certain words and sounds I stammer on, and seeing those words on a script and knowing I can't come up with substitutes I can say instead of those words makes the stammer unbearable.
@@wrathford you hit the nail on the head. People get so confused as to why I always stutter my name. No matter how many times I practice and repeat, I always trip up and have to repeat it again.
Most people don't understand that stuttering is more neurological than physical. Most people who "get over" a stutter do so by learning to rehearse what they're going to say in their head before saying it out loud. That's why Joe Biden speaks so slowly. He doesn't do that because he's old. He's always been like that. Most recovering stutterers do the same thing. Theater is great for them because they don't have to think about what to say, they just have to say it. I used to know a professional opera singer who stutters in conversation. It's an interesting condition, and makes more sense when you think of it like an anxiety around speech.
@@Bunny-ch2ul Country western singer Mel Tillis had a pronounced stutter when speaking, but he sang fluidly with no stutter. Music seems to access a different part of the brain and is incorporated in speech therapy.
Certainly leagues ahead of Melanie Griffith, who is fine in a handful of movies - I first liked her in Cherry 2000 - but whose career can be best characterised as "uneven" (and not just because of her choice of roles)
I also think about that every few months but then I look at her recent filmography and see that she still working. There are plenty of other actresses who are underrated.
I wouldn’t call her underrated, mainly because until recently she’s kinda been schlocky in her role choices (not that all the movies she was in were bad, or that she was bad in them, but they were never going to be spectacular). First Reformed was our first real taste of something more, but Mank completely broke the ceiling - I mean, she’s the front runner to win Supporting Actress now.
I’m glad someone way smarter than me was underwhelmed as well and can actually explain why. You’re amazing and you do incredible movie and actor performer analysis, not only on an academic level, but also accessible to a wide audience, bravo.
@@fadhilramadhani1847 You missed the film entirely then! It played out like fragments because it was mirroring Mank’s own script of Citizen Kane, “American”. Just like the editor sitting out at the resort and who comes around to Mank every now and then, says of the script “It’s a collection of fragments. Leaping around like Mexican Jumping beans”. I love that film so much. Best film of the year for me!
Mank was a fine film, but so emotionally shallow. I was invested in the first twenty minutes, but, LITERALLY, the thing that moved me the most was seeing Bette Davis at the party. By the way, amazing and captivating performance by Amanda Seyfried. Was someone really looking at Gary Oldman while she was on the screen?
FYI - you can post *twice* as long a video and I'll do a happy dance around the room. I could never grow tired of listening to you. Thank you especially for the bio of Marion Davis. Welles really did her dirty but so did Hearst. At least Welles faced up to this and tried to correct it somewhat.
Thank you for the section on Marion! In grad school, I started to write my thesis on her work, but was advised to choose a new topic. I was, however, able to go through the collection of her scripts, letters, etc at the Academy Library. Someday, I’ll turn all of my research into a book.
I didn't finish all of Mank because it was way too slow for me, and I feel like it wasn't as accessible to a "general" audience (i didn't know the historical context, my bad.) But I wish this had been a Marion Davies movie instead. She was definitely the most interesting character. Amanda Seyfried did a wonderful job and I wish she was in the film more. Thank you for this vid!
you’re not alone. i knew the historical context and i still thought it was boring lol. i think it needed a more charismatic actor to play Mank. sorry gary oldman 😬
I'm a classic movie buff and am personality obsessed with Citizen Kane.. Ive even visited Hearst Castle (it was magical). That said, I still haven't finished the movie. It was so dull. Maybe it is the shadowy cinematography which is beautiful but I couldn't focus. The Marion Davies character was the single bright spot of this movie.
So I'm not entirely sure what your relationship is with animated films, I happen to love them. And I wanted to reccomend Perfect Blue. It's a japanese animated film, written and directed by Satoshi Kon (who was a genius how left this world far too soon). Perfect Blue is a Psycho-Thriller that deals with topics like gas-lighting, our relationship with reality, and public image. Its BEAUTIFULLY animated. Like on par with ghibli stuff (but very different). Anyways, I thought I'd recommend it. I dont want a video on it or anything (there's plenty) but it seems like something youd enjoy.
It seems to me that if you know too much about Hollywood history Mank loses its interest and excitement, but if you know too little you don't get the full depth of the story and characters. I did a bunch of research before watching Mank and was able to find a sweet spot in between, so I really enjoyed it, but it's really hard for me to recommend for that reason.
He *may* have been the father, with her, of a kid passed off as her "niece", though... said child was publicly the daughter of Davies's sister and Arthur Lake, who played Dagwood in the long-running "Blondie" series of films.
@@davy209 There are many stories as to what that word allegedly meant. Frank Mankiewicz, Herman's son, said it was the name of Herman's bicycle that was stolen as a child. Herman himself claimed it came from the first racehorse he ever bet on, Old Rosebud.
True even doe I would love to see spike lee win best director for Da 5 Bloods he’s long overdue and gives his best directing work with Da 5 Bloods. I have a feeling Mank can be either be this year’s La La Land or American Hustle
The Academy and Holywood in general LOVES movies about movies and the industry. This one actually just so happens to be a really solid film directed by someone who has been consistently great for a long time.
This is actually looking less and less likely. The movie has been completely omitted in many of the smaller awards done by far and it barely made a dent in the top 10 list of netflix. It's very much a possibility, that Netflix won't throw it's weight behind trying to get awards with it.
I think that Orson Welles put it best: she would have been a bigger movie star without Hearst. Unfortunately, having a wealthy and older man in her life gave her the unfair tag of being a talentless gold-digger.
The story goes that Hearst refused to let anyone cast Davies in anything he didn't like. For example, Davies wanted to be Sadie Thompson in "Rain", but Hearst was horrified of Davies playing a prostitute.
In discussing inspirations for the film, you might have referred to Samuel Insull, who had many similarities to Kane, as well. Here is the Wikipedia entry about Insull: "As a model for the makeup design of the old Charles Foster Kane, Welles gave Maurice Seiderman a photograph of Chicago industrialist Samuel Insull, with mustache. A protégé of Thomas Edison, Insull was a man of humble origins who became the most powerful figure in the utilities field.He was married to a Broadway ingenue nearly 20 years his junior, spent a fortune trying to re-launch her career, and built the Chicago Civic Opera House. In 1925, after a 26-year absence, Gladys Wallis Insull returned to the stage in a charity revival of The School for Scandal that ran two weeks in Chicago.When the performance was repeated on Broadway in October 1925, Herman Mankiewicz - then the third-string theater critic for The New York Times - was assigned to review the production. Mankiewicz returned to the press room drunk and wrote only the first sentence of a negative review before passing out on his typewriter. Mankiewicz resurrected the experience in writing the screenplay for Citizen Kane, incorporating it into the narrative of Jedediah Leland. In 1926 Insull took a six-year lease on Chicago's Studebaker Theatre and financed a repertory company in which his wife starred. Gladys Insull's nerves broke when her company failed to find success, and the lease expired at the same time Insull's $4 billion financial empire collapsed in the Depression." And more specifically about Gladys Insull/Susan Alexander: "In 1926, Mrs. Insull became nostalgic for the stage and announced to her husband that she wanted to play the role of Lady Teazle in the Sheridan comedy “The School for Scandal.” Incredibly, Insull not only agreed to his wife’s desire, but guaranteed $125,000 for a two-week run at Chicago’s Illinois Theater as a charity event to benefit a local hospital.Mankiewicz was a New York-based theater critic when this production was being staged and he was sent by his newspaper to Chicago to write a review. Appalled by the sight of the 56-year-old Mrs. Insull trying to play the role of the 18-year-old aristocrat in a production that only existed due to her husband’s wealth, Mankiewicz got drunk after the performance and began writing his review of Mrs. Insull as “an aging, hopelessly incompetent amateur” before passing out at his typewriter. While his review was never completed or published, Mankiewicz incorporated the incident into “Citizen Kane,” reviving the phrase “hopelessly incompetent amateur” to describe the disastrous performance by Kane’s talentless opera-singing wife."
Such a great commentary on so many of the topics Fincher's Mank touches upon (or glasses over: women). It's actually this video the best "reparative" portrayal of Marion Davies' legacy to date. Absolutely great! Thank you!! Also, let's emphasize the LOL "I'm 43" ridiculousness. That 62 year-old Oldman (the PUN) can play 43 - in the vein of William Dafoe (63) playing Van Gogh (37) - is absurd.
So I went into this movie virtually blind. The only thing I knew about it beforehand was that Gary Oldman was starring in a David Fincher movie. I knew nothing about its subject matter and I haven’t even seen Citizen Kane yet either. I liked Mank quite a bit but it I do agree that it is very lacking. I guess the problem, for me, is that Mank doesn’t really feel like a Fincher film in a genuine way? I mean all of the “Fincher-isms” are all there but it’s honestly feels like it’s somebody else making something that reminds me of Him. If it weren’t for my knowledge of Fincher directing it, I would not have suspected him of doing so. Thanks for the video, you and The Royal Ocean Film Society’s vid truly shed an important light on this movie’s historical background.
I’m glad more people are talking about how underwhelming the third act and climax is, because that’s a problem I’ve been having with most Netflix films. Whenever I watch their movies it feels like the act structure is off, that there’s no resolution or the ending feels very abrupt. And I know that not every film has to adhere to the model and not every ending needs to be grand and tied with a pretty bow. But Netflix isn’t funding surrealist and experimental art, their filmography is rather standard linear storytelling.
One thing that I really hated about Mank was the lack of personality, I don't see David Fincher in this movie besides the technical things like he cinematography for example, his directing is very plane and "whatever", if someone said to me this movie was directed by I don't know Soderbergh I would believe it
There are multiple actors who have had help with stuttering through their craft (Marion Davies, Samuel Jackson, James Earl Jones, Bruce Willis) No idea what it does for the brain, but it must be a powerful aid
Her Pre-Hays is the best. Well, and The Women. She is, though highly stylized in an older school so by the time Thalburg croaks, she looks dated and forced. And don’t get me wrong I love her and have seen The Women no less than 10-15 times.
This is literally my confort video, ive watched it at least 15 times and i cant go to sleep without it, i know it by heart at this point. Everything is so interesting. I watched this video before i saw Mank and i think that helped me enjoy it more, because i actually found it quite entertaining. In love with your content
What kind of got me with the movie was that it imitated what old film looks like but it felt artificial. It looked way too digital and the superimposed bloops were all in the same spot. No grain. No stray lines.
That's what has put me off watching it! Black and white can be really beautiful but when filmed on digital so bland. Such a shame, I was really intrigued when I saw the trailer
@@ew3606 Yeah, same here. It was right up my alley and it fell so far from my expectations - as both a tribute to old Hollywood and a Fincher film. I do have to say I believe Roma was shot digitally and it is BEAUTIFUL. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it.
I think I’m one of the few individuals who enjoyed “Mank”. However, I just loved your video about it even more. It wasn’t too long. It was perfect. So entertaining and so full of information.
I didn’t find it funny at first but later when I thought about it, I did. Not only did I find the words funny but also the way they were expressed by Amanda Seyfried. I still laugh about it from time to time.
1:29 The fact that you looked up the address aahhhh you really need not give us more reasons to love you. We are all irrevocably in love with this channel already.
thank u! I watched Mank, Citizen Kane and this back to back and feel satisfied now. Amanda was amazing in this, such a charming and living portrayal of Marion. I feel like the movie lacks of something and finally understands what it is - movie never explains why Kane was such an important project to Hermann, it never touched the fact that Hermann was uncredited for most of his work.
As a speech language pathologist (SLP), I diagnose and treat disorders like stuttering. Furthermore, I had the unique opportunity to be educated by a SLP who had a rare, additional specialist-certification in fluency (stuttering and related disorders). People are always surprised that a case of stuttering disappears during singing, acting, or public speaking. However, it is a fact that a person who stutters will generally speak more or completely fluently when they can do any of the following: repeat a message once or more; practice, rehearse or memorize a message; modify, prepare, plan, or adapt the construction and prosody of a message to suit them; sing, chant, or use any type of musical features to deliver a message. Any of these can be used with spoken lines in acting.
Speaking as someone who does love film but isn't the most well-read when it comes to this particular period in its history, I absolutely adored Mank. The writing was just astonishingly brilliant to me, striking a perfect balance between wit and genuine depth, and I found the primary theme of the film- the power that media possesses in shaping the collective consciousness- to be particularly timely. Fincher's direction was superb (as expected), and the performances of all involved, especially Oldman and Seyfried, were stunning. I loved it so much that I'd even go so far as to say that it's one of my favourite films period. That's just my opinion, though.
Hi! I live in Cambria, about nine miles south of San Simeon and Hearst Castle. I've been to the castle many times and even worked in the movie theater at the visitor's center for two months. It's incredible to me how Marion has become such a big part of the museum exhibit (which is free,) and most of the current books about Hearst available in the gift shop (whenever it opens again,) are quick to praise her, especially for bailing out Hearst when he went broke in the mid-1930s. What a lady!
Hollywood’s “red” scare was also part of this. The only anti-Nazi movie I can think of before the war is The Mortal Storm. Marion Davies was actually really talented. Sadly her association with Hearst made her fodder for Herman. Ca NOT believe Mr. Prick Up Your Ears is cast in this ugh. To me Joe’s brilliance in Letter to Three Wives and All about Eve are hard to surpass. This collab explains why Magnificent Ambersons was pretty flat.
To be fair, post-production creative control of 'Magnificent Ambersons' was taken away from Welles. The film was edited by the studio while Welles was out of the country.
@@SM-gl8yo but when you read the book it’s a faithful representation wrt everything except one section where the aunt and son (name escapes) are living in the hotel/rooming house and the ultimate blow comes. Also, I agree wrt to how OW could have (but mayn’t of) shown the change in the town in all its industrialized glory. Where Hollywood was pretty enamored with the past and would not have supported that possibility. But I haven’t read on that movie, so I don’t know OW’s vision.
@@paillette2010 Welles wanted, arguably, a darker ending, and a darker ending was what was shot, initially. Then he left the country to do "It's All True" for Nelson Rockefeller, and the film was previewed in front of a VERY unsympathetic audience. You can imagine what happened next.
I heard someone say that Robert Downey Jr. would have been a better Mank and it kinda blew my mind. He'd bring so much more smartass trickster energy and interest. And fit the age better. Gary Oldman always felt on the edge of falling asleep mid-sentence. It would have been one hell of a better MCU follow-up than DoLittle...
I was heavily emotionally invested in the title character, Mank. He’s the unacknowledged hero throughout, who only at the very last insists on credit, realizing that this will be his last but greatest achievement.
WOW!!! What a video. Thank you so much for sharing your analysis it with us. I really enjoyed MANK and having more infos about the background is so good. Thanks a lot!
Knowing that you were going to make a video about this movie I watched it a few days ago. I admit I fell asleep about 30 minutes before the end, so invested I was not. I don't know much about this period of Hollywood history so every time a new person was mentioned, I had a feeling they were important, while also having no idea who they were.
Mank ended up being Easter egg fun for a Hollywood lover like me, but I had expected more out of it - like you mentioned, it lacked a deeper emotional journey for Herman. A different actor could have even helped with that. As someone who grew up in Culver City and still lives in Los Angeles, it was very cool to spot certain filming locations from around town! And it got me interested in learning more about who was in the Algonquin round table - would love to see a steamy rom-dramedy about George Kaufman and Mary Astor.
David Fincher's work has usually left me cold, so nothing surprising there, but I will still watch this when I get the chance. In fact, this intro will totally inform my viewing and make it all the more interesting.
Excellent Video!! Fincher shld've made a movie tt focuses on Marion Davies (who thx to Amanda Seyfried, is the MVP in Mank) instead! THAT wld be a movie all of us will get behind! lol
I really wanted to see Dorothy Parker and/or Anita Loos portrayed in this movie. I hope the attention Mank is getting for its fidelity (or lack thereof) will lead to a new cycle of films about classic Hollywood
Completely agree, I overall enjoyed the movie but knew as I was watching it that I was the target audience and thought it was a bit slow. There is no way non movie nerds are going to sit through this and if they do they are going to leave confused. I do think this is Oscar bait, a white male, important but also underdog character from Hollywood history, a period drama with great costumes and a pretty blond, inner demons to wrestle with to show off actors' skills... You know all the stuff Hollywood loves.
31:05 "That's why this age gap looks like this." In reality Herman and Sara were the same age. Yup, 62 year old Gary Oldman and 33 year old Tuppence Middleton are both playing 43!
As someone who doesn't have any active tv service in my house, I wasn't familiar with this movie, but it sounds interesting. I love older movies and know enough about movie history to enjoy even an imperfect story.
Great video! I love hearing your insight into that time. But also, I rewatched the part you said Amanda Seyfried sounded like Harley Quinn at least 10 times.
The reviews and video essays, such as yours, I've read and seen, have been way more entertaining then the film itself. As a lifelong fan of Hollywood backstories, it is such a disappointment that the movie felt so flat. And as a side note, I was really put off by Arliss Howard's portrayal of Mayer, nothing felt right there, physically or emotionally. He didn't seem at all like the Louis B. Mayer I've read so much about through my life, and have seen in news clips and interviews.
Funny, this video makes me want to watch some Marion Davies movies more than Mank did! Also it's a decent movie but you definitely need to know what's going on more than the average film buff. Like a giant white board with strings!
I literally just got done talking to Ben Mank and he said he enjoyed the movie a lot. He even liked RKO 218 and got to talk to John Malkovich. Love the videos!!
As always a great video exploration. I’m now left sad this will be our last video of the year. Easily the highlight of my month is a new video from you
I really enjoyed that. I've seen Mank so many times now, over ten times at least but probably more, and I can say, as with most of Fincher's movies, it becomes a richer experience the more you watch it. Or it does for me anyway. But I still liked how you went about analyzing it. Good stuff.
I don't know anything about this period, but was excited to see any original movie. It did feel meandering, and I felt like I was watching something like an inside story that I didn't get. I love Gary Oldman, and David Fincher, and also Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross for the score. But it felt flat. It didn't help that my TV was just not picking up any contrast, so it literally felt flat.
I loved how the film manage to imitates the classic hollywood style. I also am very happy to find a film nerd who knows and love this period of american cinema so well.
First of all, excellent video full of the wonderful insight that makes me always look forward to your videos. I'm late to this one as I kept procrastinating watching Mank, but I'll definitely be sharing this with some people now. I particularly loved the Davies section. As for thoughts on the movie, I for one loved it, though I can certainly understand people who didn't. It was absolutely gorgeous, obviously, but I also really enjoyed the characters, some of the ways in which the narrative mirrored the style of Kane (which I really need to watch again now), and I really hope Seyfried at least gets an Oscar nomination. Also, I enjoyed the fictionalization, as it really felt like a classic biopic. Granted, plenty of modern ones mess with the truth more than a little, but a lot of the classic studio ones might as well have been fictional stories many times. Anyway, hope every one here had a great Holiday season (or as much as we could safely), and I eagerly await your next videos.
Yesssssss!!! I used to be a tour guide at WB and loooved talking about Marion Davies. She contributed so much to the construction of the Warner Bros Studio lot in Burbank. Her's and Betty Davis' bungalows are still utilized on the lot, and she's also the reason why WB built an enormous soundstage with a water tank in it. I don't remember if the tank was added during or after production of Cain and Mabel, but it's nice just to see Marion Davies get some attention. :)
I just hope this role leads to better parts for Amanda Seyfried.
same
And Lily Collins
Amen. She was amazing in Mank.
And Tuppence Middleton. Sense8 is my favorite show of all time.
@@Beast80001 Tuppence is so underrated
It's actually a common thing for people with a stutter to get into theater because memorizing lines and repeating them is shown to help. It might be because each word is a known quantity which is less pressure than speaking off the cuff.
I have a stammer. For me, the opposite happens. There are certain words and sounds I stammer on, and seeing those words on a script and knowing I can't come up with substitutes I can say instead of those words makes the stammer unbearable.
@@wrathford same
@@wrathford you hit the nail on the head. People get so confused as to why I always stutter my name. No matter how many times I practice and repeat, I always trip up and have to repeat it again.
Most people don't understand that stuttering is more neurological than physical. Most people who "get over" a stutter do so by learning to rehearse what they're going to say in their head before saying it out loud. That's why Joe Biden speaks so slowly. He doesn't do that because he's old. He's always been like that. Most recovering stutterers do the same thing. Theater is great for them because they don't have to think about what to say, they just have to say it. I used to know a professional opera singer who stutters in conversation. It's an interesting condition, and makes more sense when you think of it like an anxiety around speech.
@@Bunny-ch2ul Country western singer Mel Tillis had a pronounced stutter when speaking, but he sang fluidly with no stutter. Music seems to access a different part of the brain and is incorporated in speech therapy.
And can we all agree that Amanda Seyfried is one of Hollywood's most underrated and under utilized actresses in the business today?
My favourite roles of hers are Veronica Mars, Alpha Dog and Twin Peaks The Return.
Certainly leagues ahead of Melanie Griffith, who is fine in a handful of movies - I first liked her in Cherry 2000 - but whose career can be best characterised as "uneven" (and not just because of her choice of roles)
I also think about that every few months but then I look at her recent filmography and see that she still working. There are plenty of other actresses who are underrated.
@@phoebexxlouise You forgot "Mean Girls". She really should do more comedy. :-D
I wouldn’t call her underrated, mainly because until recently she’s kinda been schlocky in her role choices (not that all the movies she was in were bad, or that she was bad in them, but they were never going to be spectacular). First Reformed was our first real taste of something more, but Mank completely broke the ceiling - I mean, she’s the front runner to win Supporting Actress now.
I’m glad someone way smarter than me was underwhelmed as well and can actually explain why. You’re amazing and you do incredible movie and actor performer analysis, not only on an academic level, but also accessible to a wide audience, bravo.
I do think that a lot of real classic cinema lovers felt that way.
Exactly! I was very underwhelmed by this movie. It just played out like a bunch of fragments with no real plot going around imho
Same here, very underwhelmed with the film. Liked the acting and some technical aspects though
@@fadhilramadhani1847 You missed the film entirely then! It played out like fragments because it was mirroring Mank’s own script of Citizen Kane, “American”. Just like the editor sitting out at the resort and who comes around to Mank every now and then, says of the script “It’s a collection of fragments. Leaping around like Mexican Jumping beans”. I love that film so much. Best film of the year for me!
You are not alone in your critique.
Mank was a fine film, but so emotionally shallow. I was invested in the first twenty minutes, but, LITERALLY, the thing that moved me the most was seeing Bette Davis at the party. By the way, amazing and captivating performance by Amanda Seyfried. Was someone really looking at Gary Oldman while she was on the screen?
Yeah, me 😊
Wait was Betty Davis there? I missed that. Maybe I nodded off.
FYI - you can post *twice* as long a video and I'll do a happy dance around the room. I could never grow tired of listening to you. Thank you especially for the bio of Marion Davis. Welles really did her dirty but so did Hearst. At least Welles faced up to this and tried to correct it somewhat.
Thank you for the section on Marion! In grad school, I started to write my thesis on her work, but was advised to choose a new topic. I was, however, able to go through the collection of her scripts, letters, etc at the Academy Library. Someday, I’ll turn all of my research into a book.
I'd love to read it!
That sounds fascinating!
@@barbarak2836 thank you!
@@myettechase thank you!
FOLLOW YOUR BLISS
Okay but Marion imitating Lilian Gish and Garbo is HILARIOUS and I need the full clips 😭
The first one is in "The Patsy". It's got her doing a whole stream of impressions in a row. :-D
I didn't finish all of Mank because it was way too slow for me, and I feel like it wasn't as accessible to a "general" audience (i didn't know the historical context, my bad.) But I wish this had been a Marion Davies movie instead. She was definitely the most interesting character. Amanda Seyfried did a wonderful job and I wish she was in the film more. Thank you for this vid!
you’re not alone. i knew the historical context and i still thought it was boring lol. i think it needed a more charismatic actor to play Mank. sorry gary oldman 😬
I'm a classic movie buff and am personality obsessed with Citizen Kane.. Ive even visited Hearst Castle (it was magical). That said, I still haven't finished the movie. It was so dull. Maybe it is the shadowy cinematography which is beautiful but I couldn't focus. The Marion Davies character was the single bright spot of this movie.
I haven’t started the film, and I’m a huge movie nerd.
I find Fincher to be a even more emotionally remote Kubrick.
So I'm not entirely sure what your relationship is with animated films, I happen to love them. And I wanted to reccomend Perfect Blue. It's a japanese animated film, written and directed by Satoshi Kon (who was a genius how left this world far too soon). Perfect Blue is a Psycho-Thriller that deals with topics like gas-lighting, our relationship with reality, and public image. Its BEAUTIFULLY animated. Like on par with ghibli stuff (but very different). Anyways, I thought I'd recommend it. I dont want a video on it or anything (there's plenty) but it seems like something youd enjoy.
Perfect Blue is so good! Definitely recommend
this is so sweet damn
It seems to me that if you know too much about Hollywood history Mank loses its interest and excitement, but if you know too little you don't get the full depth of the story and characters. I did a bunch of research before watching Mank and was able to find a sweet spot in between, so I really enjoyed it, but it's really hard for me to recommend for that reason.
I knew nothing and loved every second.
the way I thought hearst was marion davies's dad up until now... I'm embarrassed 🤧
He *may* have been the father, with her, of a kid passed off as her "niece", though... said child was publicly the daughter of Davies's sister and Arthur Lake, who played Dagwood in the long-running "Blondie" series of films.
You should take a closer look what the word “rosebud” meant to Hearst and Davies!
@@davy209 There are many stories as to what that word allegedly meant. Frank Mankiewicz, Herman's son, said it was the name of Herman's bicycle that was stolen as a child. Herman himself claimed it came from the first racehorse he ever bet on, Old Rosebud.
It will still probably win big at the Oscars as the Academy eats up this kind of film, and Fincher is overdue a Best Director prize
I hope it at least gets nominated for Best Cinematography. That was Hands Down the BEST aspect of the Film for me.
True even doe I would love to see spike lee win best director for Da 5 Bloods he’s long overdue and gives his best directing work with Da 5 Bloods. I have a feeling Mank can be either be this year’s La La Land or American Hustle
The Academy and Holywood in general LOVES movies about movies and the industry. This one actually just so happens to be a really solid film directed by someone who has been consistently great for a long time.
This is actually looking less and less likely. The movie has been completely omitted in many of the smaller awards done by far and it barely made a dent in the top 10 list of netflix. It's very much a possibility, that Netflix won't throw it's weight behind trying to get awards with it.
@@Tuosma Unlikely. It's Gary Oldman, David Fincher, and a film about 'Citizen Kane'
The screenplay for Mank is sublime and absolutely exquisite. I was captivated the entire film.
Marion Davies would have done well in the screwball comedy era. Lubitsch, Preston Sturges, Billy Wilder.
I liked the speculaiton that she would have bene great on SNL.
I think that Orson Welles put it best: she would have been a bigger movie star without Hearst.
Unfortunately, having a wealthy and older man in her life gave her the unfair tag of being a talentless gold-digger.
She was around her time was just up 🤷🏽♀️
The story goes that Hearst refused to let anyone cast Davies in anything he didn't like. For example, Davies wanted to be Sadie Thompson in "Rain", but Hearst was horrified of Davies playing a prostitute.
In discussing inspirations for the film, you might have referred to Samuel Insull, who had many similarities to Kane, as well. Here is the Wikipedia entry about Insull:
"As a model for the makeup design of the old Charles Foster Kane, Welles gave Maurice Seiderman a photograph of Chicago industrialist Samuel Insull, with mustache.
A protégé of Thomas Edison, Insull was a man of humble origins who became the most powerful figure in the utilities field.He was married to a Broadway ingenue nearly 20 years his junior, spent a fortune trying to re-launch her career, and built the Chicago Civic Opera House. In 1925, after a 26-year absence, Gladys Wallis Insull returned to the stage in a charity revival of The School for Scandal that ran two weeks in Chicago.When the performance was repeated on Broadway in October 1925, Herman Mankiewicz - then the third-string theater critic for The New York Times - was assigned to review the production. Mankiewicz returned to the press room drunk and wrote only the first sentence of a negative review before passing out on his typewriter. Mankiewicz resurrected the experience in writing the screenplay for Citizen Kane, incorporating it into the narrative of Jedediah Leland. In 1926 Insull took a six-year lease on Chicago's Studebaker Theatre and financed a repertory company in which his wife starred. Gladys Insull's nerves broke when her company failed to find success, and the lease expired at the same time Insull's $4 billion financial empire collapsed in the Depression."
And more specifically about Gladys Insull/Susan Alexander: "In 1926, Mrs. Insull became nostalgic for the stage and announced to her husband that she wanted to play the role of Lady Teazle in the Sheridan comedy “The School for Scandal.” Incredibly, Insull not only agreed to his wife’s desire, but guaranteed $125,000 for a two-week run at Chicago’s Illinois Theater as a charity event to benefit a local hospital.Mankiewicz was a New York-based theater critic when this production was being staged and he was sent by his newspaper to Chicago to write a review. Appalled by the sight of the 56-year-old Mrs. Insull trying to play the role of the 18-year-old aristocrat in a production that only existed due to her husband’s wealth, Mankiewicz got drunk after the performance and began writing his review of Mrs. Insull as “an aging, hopelessly incompetent amateur” before passing out at his typewriter. While his review was never completed or published, Mankiewicz incorporated the incident into “Citizen Kane,” reviving the phrase “hopelessly incompetent amateur” to describe the disastrous performance by Kane’s talentless opera-singing wife."
We love terrifying runtimes 🤣
Live for it!!
You've been killing it lately!! Thank you for all these uploads.
Such a great commentary on so many of the topics Fincher's Mank touches upon (or glasses over: women). It's actually this video the best "reparative" portrayal of Marion Davies' legacy to date. Absolutely great! Thank you!!
Also, let's emphasize the LOL "I'm 43" ridiculousness. That 62 year-old Oldman (the PUN) can play 43 - in the vein of William Dafoe (63) playing Van Gogh (37) - is absurd.
Or a 39-year-old (Tom Burke) playing the 24-year-old Orson Welles.
@@bluefire9147 ...I mean, if it were the ACTUAL Orson Welles, that would've been some great fuckin' magic! :-P
So I went into this movie virtually blind. The only thing I knew about it beforehand was that Gary Oldman was starring in a David Fincher movie. I knew nothing about its subject matter and I haven’t even seen Citizen Kane yet either. I liked Mank quite a bit but it I do agree that it is very lacking. I guess the problem, for me, is that Mank doesn’t really feel like a Fincher film in a genuine way? I mean all of the “Fincher-isms” are all there but it’s honestly feels like it’s somebody else making something that reminds me of Him. If it weren’t for my knowledge of Fincher directing it, I would not have suspected him of doing so.
Thanks for the video, you and The Royal Ocean Film Society’s vid truly shed an important light on this movie’s historical background.
I've been binging this channel!
I’m glad more people are talking about how underwhelming the third act and climax is, because that’s a problem I’ve been having with most Netflix films. Whenever I watch their movies it feels like the act structure is off, that there’s no resolution or the ending feels very abrupt. And I know that not every film has to adhere to the model and not every ending needs to be grand and tied with a pretty bow. But Netflix isn’t funding surrealist and experimental art, their filmography is rather standard linear storytelling.
This made me want a Marion Davies episode! Also one about the transition to talkies more generally
One thing that I really hated about Mank was the lack of personality, I don't see David Fincher in this movie besides the technical things like he cinematography for example, his directing is very plane and "whatever", if someone said to me this movie was directed by I don't know Soderbergh I would believe it
Or Gus Van Zandt, who loves to do “covers” as a director.
Agreed. This lacks Fincher's "pulse" I guess. Maybe he did it as an homage to his father? Mank has no identity.
The physical resemblance b/w Amanda Seyfried and Marion Davies is uncanny
When the video essay is better than the movie.
There are multiple actors who have had help with stuttering through their craft (Marion Davies, Samuel Jackson, James Earl Jones, Bruce Willis)
No idea what it does for the brain, but it must be a powerful aid
i’d love to see a video on Norma Shearer
I know her previous Q&A video she said she’s not a fan of Norma Sheraer films she just doesn’t see the hype surrounding her and Luis Rainer
Her Pre-Hays is the best. Well, and The Women. She is, though highly stylized in an older school so by the time Thalburg croaks, she looks dated and forced.
And don’t get me wrong I love her and have seen The Women no less than 10-15 times.
Kevin 5012 that’s a shame :(
@@batekush8135 yeah I could understand but I do like Norma movies
Kevin 5012 i can see why someone would say some are boring. i love Norma though she seems like she was so much fun
This is literally my confort video, ive watched it at least 15 times and i cant go to sleep without it, i know it by heart at this point. Everything is so interesting. I watched this video before i saw Mank and i think that helped me enjoy it more, because i actually found it quite entertaining. In love with your content
What kind of got me with the movie was that it imitated what old film looks like but it felt artificial. It looked way too digital and the superimposed bloops were all in the same spot. No grain. No stray lines.
That always bugs me!
Juxtaposing it with actual black-and-white film from the '20s, '30s, and '40s made it glaringly obvious how bad it looks.
That's what has put me off watching it! Black and white can be really beautiful but when filmed on digital so bland. Such a shame, I was really intrigued when I saw the trailer
@@ew3606 Yeah, same here. It was right up my alley and it fell so far from my expectations - as both a tribute to old Hollywood and a Fincher film.
I do have to say I believe Roma was shot digitally and it is BEAUTIFUL. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it.
I think I’m one of the few individuals who enjoyed “Mank”. However, I just loved your video about it even more. It wasn’t too long. It was perfect. So entertaining and so full of information.
When Marion said "I already made my exit" I burst out laughing
I think the movie lacked emotional stakes but I still enjoyed it, I saw it three times
I didn’t find it funny at first but later when I thought about it, I did. Not only did I find the words funny but also the way they were expressed by Amanda Seyfried. I still laugh about it from time to time.
1:29 The fact that you looked up the address aahhhh you really need not give us more reasons to love you. We are all irrevocably in love with this channel already.
This is a plus+ video just for the real-life background of Marion Davies. Fantastic.
I love seeing BK get sponsorships !!! get that coin girl
thank u! I watched Mank, Citizen Kane and this back to back and feel satisfied now. Amanda was amazing in this, such a charming and living portrayal of Marion. I feel like the movie lacks of something and finally understands what it is - movie never explains why Kane was such an important project to Hermann, it never touched the fact that Hermann was uncredited for most of his work.
who else watches all BKR videos repeatedly ? I think I have seen some of her videos at least 10 times
BKR videos are like therapy for me haha. I've also seen all of them more than once.
Yep!
Yes me too!
Same!
She adds so much content and in depth analysis that one must see each episode more than once. She knows her stuff
It's been said that Citizen Kane was far more a biopic about its' director - Orson Welles - than ever about Hearst himself. 🤔
This video was better than the actual film. Overall I found the film boring, long and tedious.. More Rank than Mank. Kinda Manky.
Me too. After about half an hour I gave up and watched something else more interesting.
@@suej3959 That's about how long I lasted. I thought it was excruciatingly dull and pretentious.
As a speech language pathologist (SLP), I diagnose and treat disorders like stuttering. Furthermore, I had the unique opportunity to be educated by a SLP who had a rare, additional specialist-certification in fluency (stuttering and related disorders). People are always surprised that a case of stuttering disappears during singing, acting, or public speaking. However, it is a fact that a person who stutters will generally speak more or completely fluently when they can do any of the following: repeat a message once or more; practice, rehearse or memorize a message; modify, prepare, plan, or adapt the construction and prosody of a message to suit them; sing, chant, or use any type of musical features to deliver a message. Any of these can be used with spoken lines in acting.
Funny that Kirsten Dunst played Marion Davies, then Marie Antoinette
Huh! The casting director must have been having fun with that :)
I've shopped at that Gristedees. I grew up in that neighborhood.
YOU'RE FEEDING US SO GOOD THIS MONTH!!!
I just happened to be online as soon as this was posted
Seyfried was amazinggg in this movie she owned every second she was on screen ( and as I’ve learned now, kind of like Marion Davies)
Speaking as someone who does love film but isn't the most well-read when it comes to this particular period in its history, I absolutely adored Mank. The writing was just astonishingly brilliant to me, striking a perfect balance between wit and genuine depth, and I found the primary theme of the film- the power that media possesses in shaping the collective consciousness- to be particularly timely. Fincher's direction was superb (as expected), and the performances of all involved, especially Oldman and Seyfried, were stunning. I loved it so much that I'd even go so far as to say that it's one of my favourite films period. That's just my opinion, though.
Hi! I live in Cambria, about nine miles south of San Simeon and Hearst Castle. I've been to the castle many times and even worked in the movie theater at the visitor's center for two months. It's incredible to me how Marion has become such a big part of the museum exhibit (which is free,) and most of the current books about Hearst available in the gift shop (whenever it opens again,) are quick to praise her, especially for bailing out Hearst when he went broke in the mid-1930s. What a lady!
Hollywood’s “red” scare was also part of this. The only anti-Nazi movie I can think of before the war is The Mortal Storm.
Marion Davies was actually really talented. Sadly her association with Hearst made her fodder for Herman.
Ca NOT believe Mr. Prick Up Your Ears is cast in this ugh.
To me Joe’s brilliance in Letter to Three Wives and All about Eve are hard to surpass.
This collab explains why Magnificent Ambersons was pretty flat.
To be fair, post-production creative control of 'Magnificent Ambersons' was taken away from Welles.
The film was edited by the studio while Welles was out of the country.
@@SM-gl8yo but when you read the book it’s a faithful representation wrt everything except one section where the aunt and son (name escapes) are living in the hotel/rooming house and the ultimate blow comes. Also, I agree wrt to how OW could have (but mayn’t of) shown the change in the town in all its industrialized glory. Where Hollywood was pretty enamored with the past and would not have supported that possibility. But I haven’t read on that movie, so I don’t know OW’s vision.
What's your issue with Gary Oldman?
@@paillette2010 Welles wanted, arguably, a darker ending, and a darker ending was what was shot, initially.
Then he left the country to do "It's All True" for Nelson Rockefeller, and the film was previewed in front of a VERY unsympathetic audience. You can imagine what happened next.
@@rafmeinster wesk in this roll, repeatedly illustrates bad American accent.
I love discovering new films through your channel.
I heard someone say that Robert Downey Jr. would have been a better Mank and it kinda blew my mind. He'd bring so much more smartass trickster energy and interest. And fit the age better. Gary Oldman always felt on the edge of falling asleep mid-sentence. It would have been one hell of a better MCU follow-up than DoLittle...
Fantastic video. Thank you! And also props for finding Joan, I kept looking for the actress that does her cameo the entire movie!
Not me waiting in my bed, not moving for 10 minutes waiting for this video 😪
With respect, I absolutely love your long-form content. I could listen to you talk about a topic for 2-plus hours.
What the hell do you mean "a terrifying run time"???? The longer the video the better!! Especially when it's made by BKR! ❤
I legitimately checked thinking maybe it was like 2 hours and I should wait until the morning to watch it.
It's so weird to hear Isabel talking about a modern filmmaker. She mentions Fincher's name and it feels so out of place lol
That was an incredibly good analysis. You deserve a bigger audience!
I was heavily emotionally invested in the title character, Mank. He’s the unacknowledged hero throughout, who only at the very last insists on credit, realizing that this will be his last but greatest achievement.
10:25 yeah, that bugged me. More now than when I first saw it.
WOW!!! What a video. Thank you so much for sharing your analysis it with us. I really enjoyed MANK and having more infos about the background is so good. Thanks a lot!
Knowing that you were going to make a video about this movie I watched it a few days ago. I admit I fell asleep about 30 minutes before the end, so invested I was not. I don't know much about this period of Hollywood history so every time a new person was mentioned, I had a feeling they were important, while also having no idea who they were.
Mank ended up being Easter egg fun for a Hollywood lover like me, but I had expected more out of it - like you mentioned, it lacked a deeper emotional journey for Herman. A different actor could have even helped with that. As someone who grew up in Culver City and still lives in Los Angeles, it was very cool to spot certain filming locations from around town! And it got me interested in learning more about who was in the Algonquin round table - would love to see a steamy rom-dramedy about George Kaufman and Mary Astor.
yessss, ive been waiting for this video!
Fun fact Joe Mankiewicz won 4 Oscars and is the great uncle of TCM host Ben Mankiewicz, Herman his grandfather. An incredible talented family
Holy shit two videos in two days I thought you didn’t like Christmas but it just came
I was waiting for this. You’re the best.
David Fincher's work has usually left me cold, so nothing surprising there, but I will still watch this when I get the chance. In fact, this intro will totally inform my viewing and make it all the more interesting.
What an amazing channel, thank you for making this video on Mank.
So many videos this month! It's a Christmas miracle! ☺️
Excellent Video!! Fincher shld've made a movie tt focuses on Marion Davies (who thx to Amanda Seyfried, is the MVP in Mank) instead! THAT wld be a movie all of us will get behind! lol
Welles was very generous. He shared his title credit with Gregg Toland!
I really wanted to see Dorothy Parker and/or Anita Loos portrayed in this movie. I hope the attention Mank is getting for its fidelity (or lack thereof) will lead to a new cycle of films about classic Hollywood
Great video! I whole heartily agree with your final thoughts!
Completely agree, I overall enjoyed the movie but knew as I was watching it that I was the target audience and thought it was a bit slow. There is no way non movie nerds are going to sit through this and if they do they are going to leave confused. I do think this is Oscar bait, a white male, important but also underdog character from Hollywood history, a period drama with great costumes and a pretty blond, inner demons to wrestle with to show off actors' skills... You know all the stuff Hollywood loves.
31:05 "That's why this age gap looks like this." In reality Herman and Sara were the same age. Yup, 62 year old Gary Oldman and 33 year old Tuppence Middleton are both playing 43!
As someone who doesn't have any active tv service in my house, I wasn't familiar with this movie, but it sounds interesting. I love older movies and know enough about movie history to enjoy even an imperfect story.
this channel is just spectacular; a new favorite.
May I just say; your channel does so much for me as a lover of old Hollywood history
All this talk of the 30s is getting me in a mood for some 30s movies.
On a side note, would you consider doing a video on Norma Shearer?
Great video! I love hearing your insight into that time.
But also, I rewatched the part you said Amanda Seyfried sounded like Harley Quinn at least 10 times.
The reviews and video essays, such as yours, I've read and seen, have been way more entertaining then the film itself. As a lifelong fan of Hollywood backstories, it is such a disappointment that the movie felt so flat. And as a side note, I was really put off by Arliss Howard's portrayal of Mayer, nothing felt right there, physically or emotionally. He didn't seem at all like the Louis B. Mayer I've read so much about through my life, and have seen in news clips and interviews.
This is mainly making me want to watch Citizen Kane again.
I really appreciate the work you put in to these videos, thank you!
Oh, this is perfect, thank you !
Funny, this video makes me want to watch some Marion Davies movies more than Mank did! Also it's a decent movie but you definitely need to know what's going on more than the average film buff. Like a giant white board with strings!
Love your work! look forward to each installment.
Jesus, this seems like you started the script after watching the movie. There is so much history and facts; my brain is gonna explode!
Great, now I ALSO hear Harley Quinn in Seyfried's performance 🤣
I hope she gets to voice the character in an Animated project
I literally just got done talking to Ben Mank and he said he enjoyed the movie a lot. He even liked RKO 218 and got to talk to John Malkovich. Love the videos!!
I got so excited to see this notification!! 🤗 My heart skipped a beat
This video was highkey more interesting than Mank itself
Also you're are showing out with all these videos this month! Love it
As always a great video exploration. I’m now left sad this will be our last video of the year. Easily the highlight of my month is a new video from you
I really enjoyed that. I've seen Mank so many times now, over ten times at least but probably more, and I can say, as with most of Fincher's movies, it becomes a richer experience the more you watch it. Or it does for me anyway. But I still liked how you went about analyzing it. Good stuff.
I don't know anything about this period, but was excited to see any original movie. It did feel meandering, and I felt like I was watching something like an inside story that I didn't get. I love Gary Oldman, and David Fincher, and also Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross for the score. But it felt flat. It didn't help that my TV was just not picking up any contrast, so it literally felt flat.
13:49 that was hilarious.
You have given me a short historic film with some comedy. I adore this.
I loved how the film manage to imitates the classic hollywood style. I also am very happy to find a film nerd who knows and love this period of american cinema so well.
First of all, excellent video full of the wonderful insight that makes me always look forward to your videos. I'm late to this one as I kept procrastinating watching Mank, but I'll definitely be sharing this with some people now. I particularly loved the Davies section.
As for thoughts on the movie, I for one loved it, though I can certainly understand people who didn't. It was absolutely gorgeous, obviously, but I also really enjoyed the characters, some of the ways in which the narrative mirrored the style of Kane (which I really need to watch again now), and I really hope Seyfried at least gets an Oscar nomination. Also, I enjoyed the fictionalization, as it really felt like a classic biopic. Granted, plenty of modern ones mess with the truth more than a little, but a lot of the classic studio ones might as well have been fictional stories many times.
Anyway, hope every one here had a great Holiday season (or as much as we could safely), and I eagerly await your next videos.
Aghhh im so happy this video finally reached 100k
I love your content and your old hollywood themes. 🙂