One of the greatest playwrights of the 20th century, Arthur Miller created such celebrated works as Death of a Salesman and The Crucible, which continue to move audiences around the world today. He also made headlines for being targeted by the House Un-American Activities Committee at the height of the McCarthy Era and entering into a tumultuous marriage with Hollywood icon Marilyn Monroe. Told from the unique perspective of his daughter, filmmaker Rebecca Miller, Arthur Miller: Writer is an illuminating portrait that combines interviews spanning decades and a wealth of personal archival material, and provides new insights into Miller’s life as an artist and exploring his character in all its complexity.
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I watch a lot of documentaries, especially those involving film, entertainment, or the arts in some capacity. It is a genre that I very much enjoy (when done right, of course). What I found here, however, was a doc that seemed to be lacking a clear focus or solid production values, producing an experience that was decidedly blasé pretty much all the way through.Probably the key thing to understand about "Arthur Miller: Writer" is this: if you are looking for an in-depth analysis of Miller's plays, you are in the wrong place. While the plays are discussed, obviously, the fare here is much more focused on his family/personal life. In that sense, this doc is pretty straightforward in terms of scope. It starts at the beginning of Miller's life and progresses right along to the end.The good stuff here is when connections are made between Miller's plays and the events that shaped his real life. To be honest, that is probably why most people are watching this to begin with (having experienced one of his plays). The middle sections of this roughly 100-minute piece are the best in this regard, as they mesh well the era of his biggest plays and his observations about them.What I really didn't like about "Writer", however, is that it almost feels like more of a stitched-together amalgam of other documentaries as opposed to one with a clear message or focus. Ostensibly, it seems to favor his daughter's home video interviews of him, but the problem of course is that those videos by themselves aren't worthy of outside viewing, as home videos so often turn out to be. They need context, and most of the time "Writer" fails (or at best barely succeeds) in providing that valuable component.Overall, I found myself getting distracted a lot and losing focus when it came to watching this, a problem I am usually not afflicted with when it comes to documentaries. Like I've said, I think this is primarily because the entire piece seems pieced together, with far too much focus on Arthur's strictly personal life, leaving a gaping hole in what we all wanted to see: more connective tissue involving his plays.
An enjoyable documentary which HBO has gotten quite good at producing. There's little doubt the Arthur Miller is one of the best playwrites in American history. There's a fairly long portion dedicated to the McCarthy hearings in the 1950's. This portion of the movie is quite revisionist because the Venona Papers that were released by the former Soviet Union confirmed that most of the people suspected by Congress were in fact communists and many were spies, including a member of FDR's cabinet.
