“Your being manipulated.”
That misspelled slogan emblazoned on the truck of Eddington Sheriff Joe Cross (Joaquin Phoenix) sums up Ari Aster’s new movie in a nutshell: As America was seized by conspiracy theories and paranoia in the early, isolating days of the COVID-19 pandemic, we all got a little dumber. Attention spans shortened and extreme views emerged from the fray. Worse yet, those extreme opinions started to make major inroads for many in power. But does Eddington, Aster’s contemporary Western that morphs into a dark and twisted conspiracy thriller, actually have much to say about the dumbing down of America beyond that? Not really.
