Trumbo sees Bryan Cranston peddling contraband. Again.
Dir Jay Roach | ★★☆☆☆
Bryan Cranston plays a brilliant, put-upon middle-aged man who is forced into peddling contraband in order to provide for his family. This time his drug of choice isn’t meth but Hollywood scripts, which he’s banned from writing – along with dozens of others – because of his Communist party membership. The subject matter is fascinating but the political turmoil takes a backseat to the more immediate, and rather mawkish, family drama. Director Jay Roach (Austin Powers) seems torn between his obvious fondness for Hollywood’s glory days, and the dirty business of the blacklist, and his film never quite finds a balance between the two.