Review by Nick Armstrong
The importance of making a film about a bygone symbol of virtue and integrity in 2019 should be obvious to anyone who is tuned into the current political climate. Retroactively having heard the wife of the film’s main character beg that he not ruin her childhood by profiling the beloved children’s television star Mr. Rogers, the film’s opening moments where Rogers addresses the audience actually read as vaguely unsettling. In Marielle Heller’s portrait of Mr. Rogers, though, the director makes it clear that she is aware of the film’s implications. She is just as careful to avoid crafting a puff piece about the celebrity as the film’s main character, Lloyd Vogel, a cynical journalist asked to write a short piece on the television star.
The film both indulges in and disproves the idea that Mr. Rogers is a saint, an otherworldly figure whose kindness knows no bounds. Rogers himself – portrayed with a pitch-perfect self-reflexivity by Tom Hanks, who also has a reputation of being sincere with his fans, adding a layer to the film’s exploration of the responsibility of celebrity – denies being seen as such, insisting that he’s only human and has struggles of his own, but the audience is not let in on the specifics. He is portrayed as a martyr who gives love and attention to others, which is evident from how he avoids revealing his personal affairs in favor of the film’s main plotline of Lloyd reuniting with his dying father.
For this reason, Lloyd acts as an anchor for the film’s audience: the reality of Mr. Rogers is blurred for both in sequences where Lloyd is placed on the set of Rogers’ show, illustrating that whether Mr. Rogers is a phony or not, his impact on others is tangible nonetheless. Heller’s genius shines here in this uncertainty, because it leaves us with what is an undeniably happy ending for Lloyd, but shows us that we’ve forgotten about what toll it may or may not have taken on Rogers himself. It’s a stunning complication of someone who presented themselves in the most simplistic fashion possible, and a wonderfully unique take on the tired genre of the biopic.