An instance where the opening credits are more seductive than the film itself, Kill the Messenger struggles to live up to its illuminatingly opaque origins.
These credits suggest an intense clandestine submersion into a frantic treacherous linguistic labyrinth by shyly presenting the cast and crew as if they're integrated non-factors in the film's journalistic fabric, integral to its action, but secondary to its impact, thereby foreshadowing a hectic clueless ambiguous submission, like The Insider, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, or The Big Sleep, byzantine yet driven, augmenting competitive professional agencies.
The film's content contains such aspects.
Journalist Gary Webb's (Jeremy Renner) life becomes a paranoid misery after he writes a story about the Reagan Administration's possible flagrantly hypocritical role in its war on drugs, applauded and awarded at first before failing to gain traction due to its extremely controversial nature.
He's cast out.
The film's form doesn't match this content well, however, as it follows Webb's path too closely, making it too comfortable and accessible by streamlining its focus.
Had a number of scenes been introduced to take the emphasis away from Webb, in order to diversify its plot by complicating its narrative structure, thereby examining the film's politics, the film's deeper issues, more variably, Kill the Messenger would have been more captivating in my opinion.
Scenes on the ground examining the contemporary Nicaraguan situation, the results, perhaps.
There are some slight diversifications but they're too residual to effectively detach themselves from the storyline and create a compelling subconscious dialogue.
The subject matter they present is still important however.
Undeniably, Webb's life ended in tragedy after he pursued the truth with the highest possible goals.
This fact is emphasized in the film.
Which functions as both enlightened tragedy, and cautionary tale.
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