DVD Review - Dominick Dunne, After the Party
Legendary Vanity Fair Writer’s Personal Journey Told in Documentary
Jun 8, 2009
For more than two decades, Dominick "Nick" Dunne has mesmerized readers of Vanity Fair magazine with his personal style of crime reportage. But it’s unfair to call Dunne a reporter. With a snarky, distinct point of view, plus a stubborn insistence on putting himself at the center of every story, Dunne really is more of an advocate (for the prosecution) than a journalist.
Dunne Disproves F. Scott Fitzgerald on Second Acts
He's the first to admit bias: "I only cover the trials of the rich, powerful and famous," he says in the film, "because it is different for them than for other people. 'Cause they've got the bucks to spend on the million-dollar lawyers..."
No matter. His pieces are among the most consistently readable and memorable magazine work of recent decades.
This film disproves Scott Fitzgerald’s oft-quoted assertion there are no second acts in American life.
Against a backdrop of Dunne’s most recent reportorial obsession – the Phil Spector/Lana Clarkson murder case (his last story for Vanity Fair) – we learn how Dominick Dunne forged a considerable second act, after completely blowing his first.
Dominique Dunne's Murder a Pivotal Event
He became famously fascinated by celebrity justice at the trial of the man convicted of killing his 22-year-old daughter, Dominique, a star of the horror thriller Poltergeist.
Among the many monied murder trials he’s covered: O.J., Claus Von Bulow, the Menendez brothers, Kennedy family relative Michael Skakel and most recently, of course, Spector.
This is a classic redemption story, and plays like one of the gossipy novels he used to write -- but more thoughtful, and certainly more moving.
Sinatra Orders Attack on Dunne
It opens with Dunne appropriately on a stage, telling an audience how Frank Sinatra once ordered a nightclub maitre ‘d to punch him out. The story sets the tone for the story of a man who somehow emerged intact from a lifetime of battering, much of it self-inflicted.
The film has a nice, moody jazz score complementing an intimate, confessional tone. Dunne appears throughout – interviewed in a multitude of settings, from his Connecticut living room to a suite at L.A.’s iconic Chateau Marmont.
The non-linear structure moves between news footage of various trials, biographical elements, personal reflections and observations by longtime associates and family.
Robert Evans, Vanity Fair Editors Among Those Interviewed for Film
The appropriately glittery roster of interview subjects includes producer and former studio chief Robert Evans, Vanity Fair editors Graydon Carter and Tina Brown, gossip columnist Liz Smith, son Griffin Dunne (himself a producer and actor) and Nick Dunne’s sister-in-law, author Joan Didion.
Dunne’s fame is as a writer, but it’s his personal backstory that makes the film so watchable:
At 82, he admits the lifelong ache he still feels over the rejection by his father, who beat him and called him a “sissy.”
There are WWII heroics, which earned Dunne the Bronze Star.
We learn of the six-week courtship and 11-year marriage to the moneyed and beautiful Ellen “Lenny” Griffin. Nick and Lenny would have five children together. Two – both daughters – would die in infancy.
Bogie Befriends Starstruck Dunne
After the war, he falls into a job in the fledgling TV industry and is befriended by Humphrey Bogart. Utterly star struck, Dunne is quickly determined to join the beautiful crowd.
Eventually, Nick, Lenny and the kids wind up living and partying lavishly in Beverly Hills. Dunne becomes a TV, and later movie executive, producing or overseeing 70s films including The Boys in the Band, Panic in Needle Park and Ash Wednesday. But along the way, self-loathing swallows him up, spurred on by the guilty knowledge he has become a “phony.”
“The reason I can write asshole so well,” he tells the silent, off-camera interviewer, “is that I once was an asshole.”
Dunne’s eventual fall from Hollywood grace is swift and graceless, thanks to a flip remark about then-superagent Sue Mengers. How he rebuilds his life and finds a second career as a writer is where the film’s heart lies.
Dunne's Sexuality Dodged in Film
After the Party paints an admiring but nonetheless balanced portrait of Dunne. For example, there’s the years-long substance abuse. And he’s called to account – and freely admits – screwing up his reportage about former congressman Gary Condit and Condit’s murdered mistress, intern Chandra Levy. (Condit sued Dunne for $11 million, then settled out of court.)
The film seems to dodge only one issue: Dunne’s sexuality. Dunne himself speaks obliquely about it, admitting he was “never good” at love and that he’s been celibate for 20 years, following prostate problems.
In any event, when Dunne says at the end, “I got the kind of life I wanted,” you know it’s true and that, for Nick Dunne, it’s the happiest ending he could have asked for.
The film drags in the last act and could have trimmed about 10 minutes. Still, it’s an engaging work. The bonus materials are negligible – dull, poorly-lit interviews with Australian co-directors Kirsty de Garis and Timothy Jolley, plus a trailer.
The DVD, available June 16, 2009 from IndiePix, retails for $24.95. It’s available in stores, online and at www.indiepixfilms.com.
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