The Company Men

The Company Men

Directed by John Wells

Runtime: 109 min.

The Company Men sentimentalizes the Middle Class that politicians love to placate. Its heroes are corporate shipping executives (Tommy Lee Jones, Chris Cooper and the always-phony Ben Affleck) who, after the 2008 recession, are caught between high-living and guilty. Its story is about how much rich guys care for their downsized employees— even though most of the story deals with Affleck’s descent into manual labor, ineptly working construction with his brother-in-law (Kevin Costner, giving the film’s only solid characterization).

This attempt at dramatizing contemporary social crisis isn’t as insightful as Robert Wise’s 1954 Executive Suite. TV writer-director John Wells (E.R.) stumps like a groveling politician; he unconsciously serves the dominant ideology behind money and power but never questions it. This pity party for the wealthy who are threatened by the possible loss of their privileges (patronizing authority, big houses that don’t look lived-in) compounds the falsehoods of movies like The Social Network. The only good moment has Jones rhapsodizing about, “Building something you can see. These men knew their worth,” and Cooper interrupting, “I liked the $500 lunches.” The worst moment is Affleck’s return to the nest—a sobering fall that turns maudlin and unbelievable when there’s no conversation between Affleck and his dad.

What goes unsaid is the upward mobility of class privilege—the advantages Wells never countenances. He avoids the obvious fact that no masculine skills or training have been passed on or handed down, or that the working class has any thoughts on fat cats or drudgery (the secrets Bruce Springsteen frequently voices). Instead, Wells offers the sentimental, Gen-X narcissism of Affleck playing b-ball with his own son. Critics who praise this politically false economic fairytale can only be part of the system—and part of the problem.