Bombshell (2019)

I can't resist the hot blonde chicks. Apparently, that was Roger Ailes' premise, too. He and Rupert Murdoch built a media juggernaut--and quite literally changed the world--using mostly the power of the flaxen-haired. This work would have you believe that Ailes was a tremendous creep, and that his media machinations happened at a tremendous cost to the well-formed mannequins employed by FOX News. The former premise seems plausible--though, as this movie itself makes clear, it's easy to cast a guy who was substantially less easy on the eyes than Megyn Kelly as a monster (I'm familiar with that reality myself). The latter premise is questionable, or at least this flick does not do a fully successful job of making that case. For certain, it does not raise the point of the Faustian bargain that these women made. It's hard to imagine that any gal grows up looking that attractive (Kelly and Gretchen Carlson are undeniably good-looking, regardless of their work as political spokesmodels) and doesn't know by the time she's 17 years old that doors open for her that would otherwise be closed to others less endowed by nature with looks (to say nothing of more or less talent). None of these women would have been there--and reaped years of benefits--without their looks, and what those looks meant to others (read: males) who employed or watched them. It also doesn't help that the movie's liberal viewpoint is bluntly apparent throughout (and voiced by Theron's Kelly, which comes across as somewhat false), and thereby distracts from what would otherwise be a more effective (dare one say, fair and balanced) indictment of Ailes and the whole operation. Oh, well--at least most of the scenes feature visuals that are nice to look at.