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Worth

Exciting, entertaining docudrama about  the Victims' Compensation Fund and its master, Ken Feinberg, played with consummate skill by Michael Keaton.

Worth

Ken Feinberg (Michael Keaton): "You know. Attorney General, I.. People are rational animals. I find if you... if you force them to the table, most behave in the way that makes the most sense."

The aftershocks of 9/11 are felt today, 19 years later, when the walls of the Trade Center came tumbling down and with it the morale of an entire nation used to being protected and respected. In the wake of that tragedy, the Victims Compensation Fund has hardly been noticed, until Michael Keaton produced Worth, Netflix’s entertaining, sturdy, no nonsense docudrama about lawyer Ken Feinberg (Keaton), an expert on dispute resolution, who volunteers to be the master administrating the fund.

The cool with which the film treats the drama of setting up the fund is remarkable, from Keaton’s perplexed Feinberg to Stanley Tucci’s equally-even community activist, who opposes the formulaic answer to the compensation. His emphasis on the individual claimants’ stories and their unequal compensation circumstances presents a challenge to Feinberg’s accountant-like formula.

Most notable is the story of firefighter Nick Donato, who died going back into the mayhem, perhaps to save his brother. While brother Frank (Chris Tardio) and the widow, Karen (Talia Balsam), are not seeking money, though the children must be taken care of, they do not acknowledge that Nick had a mistress and two children. Yet the compensation fund must address the extended family needs.

More complicated is the gay couple, not recognized by the State of New York or Virginia or one family. Initially no compensation there. In any event, the individual stories suggest the complications of administering fair and just compensation.

Worth does an admirable job highlighting the difficulty of determining the worth of any human, notably the Georgetown (my alma mater) classroom discussion at the film’s opening. It also appropriately treats the political pressure from wealthy constituents who want the compensation commensurate with their salaries and future earnings.

The docudrama gives not enough time to show Feinberg’s change of heart that I would have liked to see in debate rather than just in anecdote. However, here is an absorbing Netflix evening to show the net still cast over us all from 9-11.

Worth

Director: Sara Colangelo (The Kindergarten Teacher)

Screenplay: Max Borenstein (Godzilla vs. Kong)

Cast: Michael Keaton (Birdman), Stanley Tucci (Spotlight)

Run Time: 1h 58m

Rating: PG-13

John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts WCBE’s It’s Movie Time and co-hosts Cinema Classics. Contact him at JohnDeSando62@gmail.com

John DeSando holds a BA from Georgetown University and a Ph.D. in English from The University of Arizona. He served several universities as a professor, dean, and academic vice president. He has been producing and broadcasting as a film critic on It’s Movie Time and Cinema Classics for more than two decades. DeSando received the Los Angeles Press Club's first-place honors for national entertainment journalism.