Where's My Roy Cohn?

Name: Where's My Roy Cohn?
Genre: Documentary
Released: September 20, 2019
Duration: 97 min
Rating: 70
Cast: Anne Roiphe, Barbara Walters, Donald Trump, Joseph McCarthy, Ken Auletta

2019

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Generally favorable reviews based on 26 Critic Reviews

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Generally favorable reviews based on 9 Ratings

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6.8	User Score Generally favorable reviews based on 9 Ratings

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Movie Details & Credits

Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: September 20, 2019 | PG-13

Starring: Anne Roiphe, Barbara Walters, Donald Trump, Joseph McCarthy, Ken Auletta, Roger Stone, Roy M. Cohn, Sam Roberts, Steve Rubell

Summary: One of the most controversial and influential American men of the 20th Century, Roy Cohn was a ruthless and unscrupulous lawyer and political power broker whose 28-year career ranged from acting as chief counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy's Communist-hunting subcommittee to molding the career of a young Queens real estate developer namedOne of the most controversial and influential American men of the 20th Century, Roy Cohn was a ruthless and unscrupulous lawyer and political power broker whose 28-year career ranged from acting as chief counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy's Communist-hunting subcommittee to molding the career of a young Queens real estate developer named Donald Trump. [Sony Pictures Classics]… Expand

Director: Matt Tyrnauer

Genre(s): Documentary

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 97 min

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Critic Reviews

100

Movie Nation Roger Moore

Oct 16, 2019

In the month since this documentary went into limited release, it’s proven prophetic about events as crimes are alleged or revealed in Washington. Where’s My Roy Cohn? even seems to predict how the tidal wave of high crimes and misdemeanors might play out. Read full review

Anthony Ray Bench

Feb 4, 2019

Where’s My Roy Cohn? is a great doc that’s a tad aesthetically stale, but it will have a mass appeal even to those unfamiliar with Cohn and uninterested in politics and law. Read full review

Justin Chang

Sep 19, 2019

It offers a blunt, ruthless evisceration — which is to say, a clear-eyed assessment — of the brilliant legal mind who helped send the Rosenbergs to the electric chair and made his reputation as Joseph McCarthy’s attack dog. Read full review

RogerEbert.com Matt Zoller Seitz

Sep 21, 2019

In his mind, Cohn was still the hero of his own story. And we get the impression from this film that, right up to the bitter, agonized end, he was engaged in an internal battle to justify himself to himself, and to the world. Read full review

Peter Travers

Sep 20, 2019

Tyrnauer’s flashes of compassion for this self-hating Jew and homosexual — taught from childhood to feel ashamed of what he was and who he was — remind us that his subject’s toxic, insidious amorality did not go to the grave with him. It’s all around us, among opportunists still looking for their own Roy Cohn — just one of several reasons why Tyrnauer’s doc hits you like a punch in the gut. Read full review

John Anderson

Sep 19, 2019

Entertaining but highly conventional documentary. Read full review

Charles Bramesco

Sep 18, 2019

To fully understand Cohn, to see how the larger-than-life force shaping the latter half of the 20th century came to mold the 21st as well, requires a more penetrating approach than Tyrnauer’s easily digested, skin-deep survey. Read full review

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HollywoodGlee

Nov 27, 2019

Matt Tyrnauer (Valentino: The Last Emperor, Studio 54, Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood, Citizen Jane: Battle for the City) opened his latest work, Where's my Roy Cohn? at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, Friday, January 25th, 2019. Where's my Roy Cohn? is a documentary andMatt Tyrnauer (Valentino: The Last Emperor, Studio 54, Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood, Citizen Jane: Battle for the City) opened his latest work, Where's my Roy Cohn? at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, Friday, January 25th, 2019. Where's my Roy Cohn? is a documentary and premiered in the Sundance U.S. Documentary Competition. Utilizing traditional documentary techniques of voice-over narration, direct interviews, archival footage, and photographic stills, Trynauer exposes Cohn’s malign influence and contextualizes him as a modern Machiavelli who influences our country today at the highest level.

Cohn first came into the public eye as an assistant to J. Edgar Hoover and handled the prosecution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, a Jewish couple arrested, tried, convicted and executed for spying for Russia and securing Manhattan Project documents for the Russian government. Cohn, a twenty-three-year-old fast-rising attorney, claimed to have not only persuaded the presiding judge, Irving Kaufman, to impose the death penalty but also to have had Judge Irving assigned the case. Cohn's reward for the Rosenberg execution was an appointment as special counsel to the 1950s, US Senatorial demagogue, Joseph McCarthy.

Tyrnauer provides compelling evidence Cohn was responsible for much of McCarthy's demagoguery and rises to power. Soon, however, Cohn would cause his own and McCarthy's fall from grace. During the Army-McCarthy hearings, direct questioning revealed Cohn had a "special relationship" with G. David Schine and pressured the U.S. Army to give Schine preferential treatment. Cohn would resign after he was humiliated and pummeled with homophobic comments during the televised hearings. Cohn claimed everybody wanted him to stay on. According to those who worked with Cohn, this was not the case.

From here, Cohn would go onto be the personification of the dark arts of 20th-century American politics. Cohn became a mover and shaker of dubious means. He fluffed his persona despite inflicting financial losses on his clients and family. Trynauer shockingly unearths the origins of the seditious right wing’s ascent, revealing how Cohn, a deeply troubled master manipulator, has shaped our current political world. Cohn persistently defended himself by attacking his adversaries. Moreover, Cohn utilized the press to generate sensational public sympathy for his plight.

Cohn had refined his strategy well over the years as the primary press leaker during his McCarthy days gaining the friendship of the formidable press magnate, Walter Winchell, and a cadre of ambitious reporters. How Cohn had been able to pressure the judiciary was less clear. To me, his political clout emanated from his wide social circle of wealthy, influential friends. Cohn was known for throwing lavish parties and hobnobbed with almost every imaginable socialite of the day including then artist, Andy Warhol, and re-emerged as a New York power broker, mafia consigliere, white-collar criminal, and, eventually, the mentor of Donald J. Trump.

Following Cohn's lead, Trump began his flamboyant rise first on Cohn's shoulders and then his back. Eventually, Trump became the master of personal attacks, hyperbole, sensationalism, and utilizing the press to get out in front of the story. The similarities are uncanny and for me to say the likeness of these character trajectories are disturbing would be an understatement. One of the most powerful and politically revealing films of the festival.

Highly recommended!… Expand

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BHBarry

Oct 1, 2019

“Where’s My Roy Cohn” is a documentary covering the life of this flamboyant and obviously intelligent lawyer who, in his early 20’s became counsel for the infamous Joseph McCarthy and his Committee investigating allegedly un-American activities in government.

Directed by Matt Tynauer, it is“Where’s My Roy Cohn” is a documentary covering the life of this flamboyant and obviously intelligent lawyer who, in his early 20’s became counsel for the infamous Joseph McCarthy and his Committee investigating allegedly un-American activities in government.

Directed by Matt Tynauer, it is also the story of a self hating Jew and an equally self hating gay man who attacked homosexuals with the same vigor and vitality as he did in the pursuit of those same men to whom he was romantically attracted and sought. More than anything it is the study of evil and how it can harm innocent and principled entities and people and hopefully teaches us how to cope with it and, perhaps, even help us avoid its presence. I give the film an 8 for it not only entertains but informs as well.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

GinaK

Oct 14, 2019

An absorbing and fascinating documentary about a political powerbroker who worked behind the scenes where he had much more influence than he ever would have had if he had actually run for elective office. This is very much a “New York story” and involves political figures like Donald Trump,An absorbing and fascinating documentary about a political powerbroker who worked behind the scenes where he had much more influence than he ever would have had if he had actually run for elective office. This is very much a “New York story” and involves political figures like Donald Trump, Joseph McCarthy, and Richard Nixon among many others.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

Brent_Marchant

Mar 23, 2020

This hard-hitting documentary about McCarthy Era counsel Roy Cohn presents a rather damning portrait of its subject, one whose relentlessness, determination and drive served his dubious clients well but helped set the US down a path of unbridled greed and self-serving interests that have notThis hard-hitting documentary about McCarthy Era counsel Roy Cohn presents a rather damning portrait of its subject, one whose relentlessness, determination and drive served his dubious clients well but helped set the US down a path of unbridled greed and self-serving interests that have not only given free rein to the power elite. but have also changed the overall culture for the worse. The film features a wealth of archive footage -- so much so that it almost relies on it a little too much in telling its story -- but its team of analysts helps to balance that, offering colorful and telling commentary about a manipulative puppet master who has left quite a legacy -- and not one that anyone should be proud of.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

andrea_daley

Sep 22, 2019

Ironically, Roy Cohn was a mere child compared to today's Deep State and Corporate Media whose anti-Russia hysteria, paranoia, and conspiracy theories make Joe McCarthy and Roy Cohn look sane and sound in comparison. Furthermore, while there were REAL COMMUNISTS in government back then --Ironically, Roy Cohn was a mere child compared to today's Deep State and Corporate Media whose anti-Russia hysteria, paranoia, and conspiracy theories make Joe McCarthy and Roy Cohn look sane and sound in comparison. Furthermore, while there were REAL COMMUNISTS in government back then -- the likes of Morton Sobell and the Rosenbergs sent Nuclear secrets to mass murderer Stalin -- , there has been ZERO evidence of Russia collusion with Trump. But the Power gets to do as it wishes, and the kind of snakes in Hollywood who made this movie seem to be lacking in self-awareness. Btw, Cohn had much in common with current Hollywood oligarchs. He was an arch Zionist who, like rest of Hollywood, supported the genocide of Palestinians.… Expand

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