Clint Eastwood’s Richard Jewell is set to be released on December 13th, 2019.
In case you weren’t aware, the movie is based on the true story of Richard Jewell, a security guard during the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games who discovered a bomb and tried to evacuate the grounds before it would detonate. However, as the police started investigating the drama they started to realize that Jewell could be a suspect and, in fact, responsible for entire the bomb hoax.
The general reviews for the film are mixed-to-positive with many journalistic quarters having qualms over the film’s negative depiction of the media and the FBI.
I do have to include something that was posted just two days ago, a harsh Daily Beast piece by Nick Schager suggesting that the film is some kind of “poisonous pro-Trump effort” that is essentially a series of pro-Trump talking points. Huh? Fine, the FBI and the press are most definitely the villains in the film, but that’s because they both really did smear Jewell, who was an innocent man.
“Clint Eastwood’s Richard Jewell wants to be a gripping, outrage-inciting drama about an innocent victim persecuted by — and driven to fight back against –institutional power,” said Schager. “Unfortunately, what it turns out to be is a MAGA screed calibrated to court favor with the red hat-wearing faithful by vilifying the president’s two favorite enemies: the FBI and the media.”
I must have missed the memo that the FBI is now a trusted and morally superior institution and that if you are not conditioned to support them then you are nothing more than a MAGA hick.
The truth is this, and it won’t even be disputed by the media because, well, it actually happened. Remember, facts matter. Back in 1996, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and NBC, went well beyond just leaking Jewell’s name to the media, they also provided the results of the investigation and made unwarranted conclusions about Jewell's participation in it. I remember the coverage and how many people went all-in on the idea that Jewell was the bomber. It wasn’t correct conduct then and it most definitely should not constitute correct conduct today.
Since facts matter, let’s take a look at a paragraph from an AJC/The Atlantic write-up from 1996:
“Richard Jewell, 33, a former law enforcement officer, fits the profile of the lone bomber,” wrote Kathy Scruggs and Ron Martz in the second paragraph of a story in an “Extra” edition of The Atlanta Journal on July 30, 1996. “This profile generally includes a frustrated white man who is a former police officer, member of the military or police ‘wanna-be’ who seeks to become a hero.
Of course, there were also these headlines about Jewell from AJC:
”Security Guard Had Reputation as Zealot”
“Motive? Could Be Sociopath, Attention Seeker,”
”Crimes Committed by Guards Plague Security Industry”
”Change of Fortune”
”Security Woes Hit AT&T Site”
Jewell was also compared to Wayne Williams — the infamous Atlanta child murderer:
AJC columnist Dave Kindred, in his second column on Jewell in two days, compared the scene to the time law enforcement officers sought evidence against Wayne Williams, the man convicted of two murders in Atlanta’s missing children case when “federal agents came to this town to deal with another suspect who lived with his mother. Like this one, that suspect was drawn to the blue lights and sirens of police work. Like this one, he became famous in the aftermath of murder.”
Here’s the closing line: ”Richard Jewell sits in the shadows today. Wayne Williams sits in prison forever.”
Of course, instead of the AJC owning up to the total and utter fuck-up they made more than 23 years ago on the Jewell case, the blatant collusion they embarked on with the FBI to smear this poor man, no, they decide to double-up in 2019 and maintain a straight face through it all by complaining that Eastwood’s film is misrepresenting them. Ha!
“This is essential because the underlying theme of the movie is that the FBI and press are not to be trusted. Yet the way the press is portrayed often differs from reality,” the AJC said in an open letter to TheWrap.
What happened to the press holding its own accountable? If you engaged in unethical behavior as a journalist than you reap what you sow. And yet, these days, if you criticize anything the mainstream media says or does then you will automatically get scolded as a Trump stooge. They will make the assumption that the fifth estate is under threat because we have a President who keeps scolding the likes of The New York Times and The Washington Post as “fake news.”
“Richard Jewell” is, in fact, Eastwood’s unrelenting condemnation of a corrupt FBI and a news media willing to go along with any narrative they deem click-worthy.
Jewell was a hero, a man who used his training to spot the bomb, a man who risked his own life to evacuate the area, it was a selfless act which helped save a lot of lives. And yet, he was the victim of a smear job courtesy of institutions that Americans are taught to trust. It’s a cautionary tale that should not be lost, no matter how sly the cover-up may be.
Now it looks like Bradford Young — who took a sabbatical from movies these last seven or eight years — has attached to the project as DP. This is a welcome surprise.