Dark Waters (2019)

Directed by Todd Haynes. Starring Mark Ruffalo, Tim Robbins, Bill Camp, Anne Hathaway, Victor Garber, Richard Hagerman, Mare Winningham, Bill Pullman, Carla Pfeiffer, Denise Dal Vera, Jeffrey Grover, Barry Mulholland, Bruce Cromer. [PG-13]

After his character was murdered by one of the Du Pont’s in Foxcatcher, Mark Ruffalo is out for revenge…by playing the Cincinnati corporate defense lawyer who sues the DuPont chemical manufacturing company in connection to the hazardous nature of a chemical dumped in a landfill that causes birth defects and cancers. Based-on-truth muckraker covers a lot of familiar ground in its obsessive quest mired in the horrors of environmental ruin and bodily devastation, and the slate grey interiors and desolate rural exteriors make for a safe, muted journey toward aesthetic nobility, but the reluctant “little guy” fighting injustice will always be a worthy dramatic scenario. Takes its time getting going, but even as the script navigates the shopworn techniques and characters (the outraged victims, the sallow faces representing the sick multitudes, the heartless corporate representatives, etc.), the film succeeds enough to fall just short of riveting. Restrained and recognizable by director Haynes’ standards—for better and worse—he peddles a tasteful brand of crusading here, but there’s still the texture of an impresario of the dysfunctional. Script by Matthew Michael Carnahan and Mario Correa, based off a Nathanial Rich article in New York Times Magazine titled, “The Lawyer Who Became DuPont’s Worst Nightmare.”

74/100