Even liberal newspapers aren’t raving about the pro-gun control film Miss Sloane. Jessica Chastain stars as a lobbyist pushing for anti-Second Amendment legislation. But the movie only has a 67 percent fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
The reliably liberal New York Times couldn’t work up much interest. Film critic Stephen Holden complained, “Partly because Miss Sloane is more a character study than a coherent political drama, it fumbles the issue it purports to address, and it eventually runs aground in a preposterous ending. In light of the recent presidential election, it all feels like small potatoes.”
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The Boston Globe was equally unimpressed. Peter Keough chided:
Chastain puts on the persona like it's a superhero costume. It is an awkward fit. Madden's stagy direction doesn't help ... nor does first-time writer Jonathan Perera's pseudo-Sorkinesque, exposition-laden, quippy dialogue.
The Washington Post gave the film three stars out of four. Film critic Pat Padua finally mentioned the “L-word,” liberalism, in the final paragraph:
This taut political thriller, set amid the soulless office architecture of K Street, has an ostensibly liberal bent, but its antiheroine’s Machiavellian methods turn the film’s subject away from its cause, portraying lobbyists and politicians in a dark light.
Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun Times was one of the rare critics who adored the movie, hailing it as a “big juicy popcorn thriller.” Praising the character “Elizabeth Sloane,” played by Chastain, he contrasted her with the “old-school right-winger” in the movie:
Elizabeth and her team of Millennial Go-Getters are working for the most powerful lobbying firm in Washington when the big boss, George Dupont (who else but Sam Waterston), enlists her to close a deal to get the business of the old-school right-winger Bob Sanford (Chuck Shamata), who is out to kill a moderate gun control measure that wouldn’t infringe on basic Second Amendment rights but would merely install some common-sense vetting measures.
Overall, Miss Sloane simply isn’t getting the kind of praise one might expect from a gun-grabbing film out of Hollywood.
