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'Trumbo'

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BY JOHN ANDERSON | Special to Newsday

June 27, 2008

Given Hollywood's congenital negligence toward writers, Dalton Trumbo is far more famous for having been on the House Un-American Activities Committee's blacklist than he would have been for all the scripts he wrote, co-wrote or adapted (among them, "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo" "Kitty Foyle" and, under pseudonyms, "Roman Holiday" and "Spartacus"). You might say being persecuted by Congress was a good career move for the screenwriter and novelist ("Johnny Got His Gun").

Trumbo's writings make up a large part of "Trumbo," which is half-history, half-expressionistic theater, and based partly on son Christopher Trumbo's Off-Broadway show. The film is an enlightening recap of '50s Red Scare politics, and a parade of actors giving meaningful, earnest readings of Trumbo's speeches and letters. Inertia is frequently the outcome, and whether it's fair or not, the titular subject is more often than not portrayed as a guy in love with the sound of his own voice or, at least, the rhythms of his own pen. One can't deny his courage, though, or his pugnacity, qualities well portrayed in this Peter Askin-directed documentary hybrid.

(PG-13)

PLOT Documentary-cum-stage play about Dalton Trumbo, the most prominent of the Hollywood Ten

CAST Nathan Lane, Liam Neeson, Michael Douglas, Paul Giamatti, Joan Allen

LENGTH 1:36

PLAYING AT Lincoln Plaza Cinemas, Sunshine Cinemas, Manhattan. Coming July 25 to Cinema Arts Centre, Huntington

BOTTOM LINE Interesting recap of the era, but a ponderous veneration of Trumbo.