In October 2017, after years of conspicuous prime-time wisecracks about that smarmy, skeezy Harvey Weinstein, The New York Times published the first of many accounts suggesting the full extent of how badly, and criminally, the Oscar-winning movie producer had preyed on women for decades.
Crucially, it also detailed the lengths to which Weinstein’s company, Miramax, threw money at several of the women, to the tune of tens of millions of dollars in discreet settlements. The payouts and nondisclosure agreements muzzled the victims and smoothed the Miramax path back to business as usual, however Harvey and his brother, Bob, chose to define it. “She Said” examines that business and the protection racket underneath.
Based on the Times stories and the 2019 book of the same title, screenwriter Rebecca Lenkiewicz dramatizes how reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, played by Zoe Kazan and Carey Mulligan, got that story. The results under Maria Schrader’s cool, forceful direction are nearly as effective as “Spotlight,” to name the recent high-water mark in the journalism procedural genre.
