There are two different versions of Hugh Jackman out there; the grizzled, muscular, angst machine that is Wolverine, and then there is his more mature serious side, and finally his carefree musical side. Personally, I have come to love his work in the X-Men franchise above all others, with each successive film becoming more and more like the character. It's this ability to really become the character, that always draws me to Hugh Jackman's other films.
In The Front Runner Hugh Jackman plays Gary Hart in this dramatization of a true story about the US Senator, whose presidential campaign in 1988 was rocked by a scandal. The whole film attempts to bring into discussion the downfall of serious journalism towards tabloids and clickbait, constantly asking whether someones personal life is relevant when it comes to their political career; whether people running for public office have the right to privacy.
Unfortunately, the choices in focus for the film reduced the effectiveness of its argument. The film tells us in the opening scenes that Gary Hart is the front runner. It doesn't show us that. It simply comes up in a line of text while also mentioning how fragmented and split the Democratic party is. All in the first few minutes. It doesn't give us any sense of the popularity of the person, or what the public opinion is. There is no way to judge a man's rise or fall if we do not know where he starts. It is these unfocused and rather poorly developed aspects of the story that affect the strength of the message. If you want to talk about the effect of an event on Hart's family, you need to spend the time to truly introduce them and delve into that relationship otherwise there is nothing to compare it to, nothing to empathise with.
The film itself likes to provide a rather realistic portrayal of the cacophony that is the campaign trail in America. Campaign teams, reporters and photographers, there are several occasions where the camera pans across a room, and the focus switches from one person to another, to another. Or from a person to a television show, all while still continuing the audio from the previous focal point at a reduced but still significant volume. It works great to demonstrate the amount of crosstalking and chatter that is constantly going on, with so many different things going on at once, but it also comes across as muddled and can be difficult to follow.
Despite all of this, Hugh Jackman puts on a stellar performance. You can truly empathise with this man that wants to do a job well but is constantly being distracted by things that he deems irrelevant to the job. Instead of focusing on policies and plans, the attention is being put into gossip and rumours, and you can feel that shift in control, tension and frustration.
Overall, The Front Runner puts forth an interesting argument about the effects of bringing in the personal lives of people in public office and the potential loss of the best candidates in campaigns due to the unescapable breach of privacy that would follow. While it's an intriguing discussion point, the film fails to provide the depth of story and character to properly get its point across, and you leave the theatre- not disappointed or pleased -but rather apathetic towards it.
A relevant premise for the US today, but poorly executed.