Shirley
In John Ridley’s “Shirley,” we witness the 1972 presidential campaign of Shirley Chisholm (Regina King), the first black woman to serve in the United States Congress and a woman who campaigned in her own right to be the Democratic Presidential nominee. Depicted along the timeline of her run for office, “Shirley” portrays how Chisholm confronted the misogynoir that sought to stifle her and pays tribute to the unwavering passion and determination of a woman who sought to be the first and the next best thing in a society that claimed to offer hope. But just like last year’s “Rustin,” “Shirley” shows the same weakness of Netflix’s formula once again, its almost comedic blandness.
As the title suggests, ‘Shirley’ tracks Chisholm’s journey into Congress which is supposed to be a historical backdrop a group picture on the steps of the Capitol. Among her white male peers, her proud shoulders and head held high were conspicuous, and as snide remarks came her way she shot back with a pride induced poker face. Right from the beginning, “Shirley” tells you that its star is not folding any time soon.
Next, we are presented with the starting point of her presidential campaign, and this particular topic will then take center stage throughout the rest of the motion picture. Shirley devises a plan and recruits her crew; her husband, Conrad (Michael Cherrie), her aides, Wesley McDonald Holder (Lance Reddick) and Arthur Hardwick Jr.
She did not have it easy when she joined the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) having made her debut in the movie “The Butler” in 2013 with one of the actors in the film Terrence Howard and a certain Robert Gottlieb played by Lucas Hedges who is a law student more in touch with the contemporary audience. The two are fully aware of the various factors that delimit Shirley from being competitive in the race. She is not only an African American woman, but she is also an inexperienced politician, having served only for a single term as a Congresswoman before expressing the desire to run for President.
But then Shirley Knew persons, and she operated within the ideology of the state. It is obvious that there was no upside down the rules of penning cowardice in her doctrine – once she even taught Gottlieb that to be humble in a word is too cocky. “Shirley” has the inexplicable trait of almost revering its subject. In other aspects, however, the film is lecturing treating a historical documentary as a sprint through the notes on the timeline within the given time rather than spending the minutes of the length of the film on the woman.
“Shirley” positions itself as an energetic captivating political dossier, yet advanced neither the attention to detail that excluded it from being a historic piece. It is excruciatingly one dimensional, preferring to lack nuance and earned emotion for ham fisted bullet point centuries prose and forced pathos.
When it comes to the story of Shirley, we are told mostly about her unwavering spirit and the period of time of her achievements. Such knowledge does not excite the reader more than her Wikipedia page would, and this less respectful, quick review of an American heroine is one that warrants a sigh.
Despite starring a cast of actors that are applauded, it is not possible to redeem a film like “Shirley” since the storyline is more event-driven than character-driven whereas it should be the characters that make the story comprehensive. Shirley is in fact more like a rough template in her own movie as little attention is paid to anything apart from the headlines. They have Chisholm’s bitter sibling and a sad spouse but even when these psychologically ambushed scenes are briefly told (most of these stakes are definitely underplayed) the acting is painfully unreal. The upside of this is that there is no effort in the screenplay to present Chisholm in different forms. Her boundless optimism and zeal for success is of course at the very front but even with King’s efforts, Shirley as a character loses form due to the constant sneers and the stiff upper lip, and more unfortunately, so does the film.
Thus, Shirley does not hold thoughts of a complete character and in turn, we are left with a big gap in the emotional connection. Regina King is excellent stormy passion and spunk rather stormy passion and spunk seem to be her forte, they are made to come out right within the inner depths of Chisholm’s voice. This is a very sad irony that her very active and committed emotional performance and the requirement of the achievement and the narrative are mutually exclusive within the confines of the film.
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