Mark Felt English Movie

Mark Felt has the right kind of political and investigative thrills, although by compromising on the soul which is its character study. Dec 9, 2017 By Vighnesh Menon

At a time when biopics have turned into a well-defined and bankable subgenre in Hollywood alone comes another that embraces its understanding of the biographical and real- Mark Felt. It is a film which will naturally be assessed with the classic, All the President's Men, for the common subject matter, but somehow finds its feet. 

Imperfect and compromising at times, Mark Felt, the film, still produces the right intrigue and demands to be taken seriously, just like its titular character. Its relentless pace does not promise great density. But, on face value, it has a hero whose legacy in itself is worth following that you forget how much of it amounts to actual cinematic value. 

Liam Neeson looks and sounds like he is born to play the role of the authoritative and bureaucratic FBI official Mark Felt, whose whistleblowing reverberated in the White House for decades to come. Yet, nothing spectacular comes from the actor who is unable to get rid of his idiosyncrasies and get into the skin of the character and his thought process. Moreover, what could make or break the film was the demystification of Felt. Here, director Peter Landesman does so with a lot of commitment and specificity, reimagining his body language during this extended time of personal and professional crisis. This is All The President's Men in an alternate reality, where Felt is not a faceless figure lurking in the shadows but a controversial individual who takes centrestage, with layers of motivations and characterization stacked to each of his actions. That also means that Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein- the legendary reporters who risked their lives to crack the Watergate scandal- are out of the picture in a story which had so much to do with them. 

In Mark Felt, it is two steps forward, one step back. Rivetting back and forth dialogues and a strange sense of paranoia move the plot forward. But the conversations are stacked with dumbed down exposition. There is also a well-orchestrated, gloomy soundtrack which is overused to cheaply manipulate the senses. 

Mark Felt has a stimulating, if underdeveloped, narrative that will never bore you, even though its potential to linger in your mind or do something special goes for a toss.