A bit of a bore, is 'J. Edgar'. Leonardo DiCaprio puts in a very good performance as the titular character and his co-stars are all solid, but I just found the way that the story is told to be lacklustre. There aren't, at least for me, any memorable scenes and I wasn't invested in the plot at any point really. It's semi-watchable, but goes on for too long to be passably so. It does, as noted, have a neat cast list, with Armie Hammer, Naomi Watts and Judi Dench, among others, involved behind DiCaprio. I think they all give their best, with any issues I have with this 2011 release being away from them. Two duds in a row to start the 2010s from Mr. Eastwood; in my humble opinion, of course.

Expectations have a huge influence on my perception of a film and there is no better example than J. Edgar. I had only heard criticisms of Clint Eastwood’s biopic of the infamous FBI director which led to my surprise on how much I enjoyed it. Yes the color gradient is too grey and the old man make up is jarring, but J. Edgar is a competent period piece that chronicles the modernization of America through the life of a highly flawed man. This film dips into the fascinating post WWII American history which blends well with the performances of Leonardo DiCaprio, Armie Hammer, Naomi Watts, and Judi Dench.

The idea of exploring someone as complicated as J. Edgar Hoover is interesting, but the movie never really finds a way to make the story exciting. The performances are committed, but the pacing makes it feel much longer than it needs to be.

While the acting performances, especially by DiCaprio, are excellent and the the makeup is mostly excellent too, the movie still misses to be great. Eastwood tries to put too much into one movie, thus cutting corners everywhere and ending up with a movie that feels too long and still failing to tell the sup-plots satisfyingly. What it depicts well, according to historic sources, is the character of Hoover. But after the first hour we got it, and the rest feels a lot like repetition of the same. Do not get me wrong. It is not a terrible movie, but it could have been great, thus failed to be so.

As a film, I did not like for the Oscar. I did not like the directing, I felt it somewhat inconsistent... but DiCaprio's acting is very very good, only because of him is worth it (because makeup is bad too).