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Feb 10, 2015MICHAEL TAGGART MALONEY rated this title 1 out of 5 stars
The movie hopscotches back and forth in time from the Palmer Raids to JFK's assassination to the Lindbergh kidnapping to Hoover's campaign against MLK, Jr. to his gangster wars campaign of the 1930s. The movie is bloodless with no coherent statement about Hoover's FBI and the role it played in America. Hoover's COINTELPRO; his role in sculpting the Warren Commission Report; his close association with organized crime bigwigs and right-wing captains of industry -- all go completely unmentioned or are alluded to only in passing. Mostly this movie is a gay love story. The lovers are J. Edgar and his abused companion, Associate Director of FBI Clyde Tolson. It is as if Eastwood shelves good storytelling in order to out the paranoid, megalomaniac, top lawman commie fighter as nothing but a poor queer. Don't see this movie unless you want to suffer.