Our take
Given the number of exposés Sy Hersh has written in his lifetime, the way Cover-Up jumps from story to story can be a bit jarring for casual viewers. It’s a lot. From the My Lai massacre in the 1970s to some of today’s hot-button issues, there’s so much violence he’s uncovered being done in the name of the nation. Certain segments, such as his childhood and marriage, help provide context to how he’s able to continue despite all the trouble. And surprisingly, the film also gets into what he got wrong. Ultimately, however, the documentary works because of focusing on his ethos. Cover-Up is as relentless as the man himself.
The story
He's devoted his career to uncovering stories the powerful want buried. From My Lai to Abu Ghraib, dig into the life's work of journalist Seymour Hersh.
Elsewhere
"He emerges as a flawed human rather than a bastion of perfect judgement. This is not a perfect documentary either... Yet perfection is not the point when something impossible has been bottled: it's something called the truth."
— Sophie Monks Kaufman
"A brief foray through Hersh’s late career suggests that he is not without his failings. Still, one can only stand in awe of his dogged determination to reveal a history that is, as he remarks with typical understatement, so hard to write."
— Catherine Wheatley
The details
Who picked it
Isabella Endrinal is a curator at A Good Movie to Watch. She's now free from the corporate night shift. Previous articles have been published in outlets such as NANG Magazine. She's currently catching up on some classic films… if she isn't coping with the fact that the Haikyu anime will end soon.
