Jackie, a movie directed by famed Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larrain, is a biopic that follows the life of First Lady Jackie Kennedy in the immediate aftermath of the President’s assassination in 1963. Kennedy, who is played by Natalie Portman, over the course of the film struggles to come to terms with her own faith in the wake of her husband’s sudden death, as well as the legacy he left behind as both a man and a politician.
Being that it is directed and written by two unlikely sources — Larrain, who is known for his foreign language work in Chile, and Noah Oppenheim whose only other writing credits are for Allegiant and The Maze Runner — the film is not constructed in a way that fits the mold of a standard biopic. Instead of progressing through the events of the film in a linear manner, Jackie is told entirely out of chronological order, skipping between a few key moments leading up to, during and following the death of John F. Kennedy. It opens at the end of the story during an interview with a reporter a few weeks following his death, and intercuts the interview over the course of the movie with scenes from her 1962 televised live tour of the White House, the tragic events in Dallas and the funeral preparations and proceedings immediately afterward.
The unorthodox way in which the movie is written and edited proved to be the film’s biggest asset, as, from a dramatic standpoint, the story was not particularly eventful. Most of the tension and drama that occurred during the course of the story dealt with Jackie Kennedy’s internal conflict regarding the traumatic nature of her husband’s passing, so had the film moved forward in a chronological manner it would have essentially been a quick setup, followed by a brutal death scene, then 75 minutes of exposition that would’ve lost the interest of most viewers before the halfway mark.
While Larrain’s foray into English language filmmaking was interesting to watch from a technical perspective, the emotional core of the film did not reach the heights that one would hope for or expect. Portman’s performance, which earned her an Oscar (though she is on the short list of actresses that get the Oscar nod for anything they do, regardless of quality), is a solid portrayal of Jackie Kennedy that nails all the minor details of her personality, but fails to ever rise above "pretty good." The film seemed to be continuously building to a point of emotional climax where Portman would dominate the screen, make an Oscar-worthy statement, and put forth an incredible message of female empowerment that would resonate with critics and viewers alike, but it instead just builds toward a couple minor dramatic peaks and comes to a nice conclusion. It’s not as if Jackie was bad or anything less than solidly above average, but given the A-list cast and the hype surrounding Portman’s performance, it felt a tad underwhelming.
One of the more anticipated films of this awards season (particularly due to Portman in the leading role), Jackie is not the next great biopic but it's still a solid piece of cinema that is well worth the small price tag and modest runtime of 100 minutes. Also, to give a quick nod to two aspects which I rarely focus on in my reviews because I’m typically pretty inattentive, the costume and set design deserve special mention for their extreme attention to detail. The White House is accurately furnished and the pantsuits are aplenty.
Three and one-half stars (out of five).
