SCANDAL (1989) - Movie Review

Director: Michael Caton-Jones
Starring: John Hurt, Joanne Whalley, Bridget Fonda, Ian McKellen, Daniel Massey, Britt Ekland, Jeroen Krabbe
Genre: Drama, History
Writer: Michael Thomas
Runtime: 106 min
Rated: R
Buy This Movie: Blu-ray (Amazon), DVD (Amazon)

This blog is supported by its audience. When you buy through links on my blog, I may earn an affiliate commission.

Synopsis:

English bon-vivant osteopath is enchanted with a young exotic dancer and invites her to live with him. He serves as friend and mentor, and through his contacts and parties she and her friend meet and date members of the Conservative Party. Eventually a scandal occurs when her affair with the Minister of War goes public, threatening their lifestyles and their freedom. Based on the real Profumo scandal of 1963.

Review:

The 1960s Profumo Affair, a sex and spies scandal that helped topple the Conservative Party government of Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, was perhaps the biggest scandal in British political history. It's also the fascinating subject of director Michael Caton-Jones's 1989 drama "Scandal", which despite mixing some fiction with the history, is mostly an accurate chronicle of the events.

The film is pretty much a straightforward docudrama, but it's interesting that Caton-Jones and writer Michael Thomas ("The Hunger", "Ladyhawke") opted for a sympathetic depiction of the story's two central characters. The first is infamous osteopath Stephen Ward ( John Hurt), who made his way into the establishment's inner circles by providing party girls for the rich and famous. The other is 18-year-old exotic dancer turned "It" girl Christine Keeler (Joanne Whalley), who was involved in an affair with Secretary of State for War John Profumo (Ian McKellen), as well as with Soviet naval attaché Yevgeny Ivanov (Jeroen Krabbé).

Ward groomed Keeler and girls like her for sex, but the movie depicts their relationship as more profound than that, as Ward becomes a mentor/friend of sorts, and Keeler confesses her love and loyalty for him. It's an interesting angle that the filmmakers use to provide the film with an emotional anchor that helps it rise above the real-life story's sordidness. Hurt and Whalley both deliver nuanced performances which bring humanity to roles that could have been played up for sensationalism. Keeler is neither innocent nor naive, she knew exactly what she was getting into and made the most of it, while Ward is depicted as something of a tragic figure, a scapegoat for the establishment, thrown to the wolves while the top dogs were protected from prosecution, which also lends a tone of righteous indignation to the film's third act.

The film also benefits from good supporting turns from McKellen and Bridget Fonda as Mandy Rice-Davies, another one of Ward's girls who was involved in the scandal. Originally the script was written as a five-hour mini-series, and at times it feels like some of the story's connective tissue has been culled. Overall, it doesn't really hurt the narrative flow, but it prevents the story from reaching a deeper level of understanding due to the necessity of covering all the facts in under two hours.

"Scandal" is a terrific and underrated movie, an unflinching look into the dark and seedy underbelly of one of modern history's most controversial scandals. Even if you're not into historical dramas, the incredible cast is well worth the watch alone.

SCORE: 8/10