There is another superhero who fights for truth and justice and the American Way. Known as The Notorious R-B-G, she is Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. This documentary shows how the shy, soft-spoken, tenacious worker and uber-smart octogenarian became a force to be reckoned. She’s considered a rock star with who is still going strong.
Documentarians Julie Cohen and Betsy West both come from TV News. When the Justice started getting a pop culture persona, including bits with Kate McKinnon playing her on SNL, (fun watching her laugh out loud watching a segment), they told Bader Ginsburg they wanted to do a film on her. Her response? “Not yet.”
They started gathering archive footage of Bader Ginsburg before they even met her! They show how she fought for gender equality in the courts after she was not given the chance to work in a law firm herself in the 1970’s. She was told there was no place for a woman even though she was top of class at Columbia and one of the first women to graduate from Harvard Law School. That didn’t stop her.
Cohen and West show she not only defended equality, but lived it. She had a long and very happy marriage to the fun and funny Marty Ginsberg, one of the best New York tax lawyers who put his career on the back burner for her. He agreed to move with her to Washington, D.C. when her career took off. She sparkles watching old film footage showing them together and now just talking about him.
Her accomplishments are impressive, but the film is fascinating because it also shows her personal life through home movies, interactions with her husband, her children and grandchildren and long relationships with colleagues and friends. You see this tiny, frail-looking woman, who beat cancer twice, work until 4 in the morning, but will also burn calories in the gym, and has a great sense of humor. She knows how to have fun.
Bader Ginsburg’s passion, besides family and the law, is opera. Why? She loves the drama, mercy and justice it portrays as well as the music she says electrifies her. There is remarkable footage of her with polar opposite on the Supreme Court, the late Anton Scalia, enjoying opera together. Both in costume, appearing in the same opera, is amazing to see. That was common ground. What is remarkable in those scenes, is that it’s evident they had great respect for each other and didn’t let their opinions on the court get in the way. They were friends!
Cohen and West show her strength doing some heavy lifting working out with a trainer wearing a sweat shirt displaying “Super Diva.” She also shows her artistic creativity sporting collars called jabots. She and former Supreme Court Justice, Sandra Day O’Connor chose to wear these instead of the ties the male justices under their judicial robes.
Cohen and West show how the smart, attractive, determined young lawyer took a case defending a male whose wife had died in childbirth. He was denied Social Security benefits because he was a man. She began to establish her credentials as a fighter for equality arguing the case before the Supreme Court. Bader Ginsburg kept defending men and women in cases based on gender discrimination, being appointed a Federal Judge in 1980 and then to the Supreme Court by a vote of 96-3 in 1993. The footage showing her close-up standing up to questioning by the panel led by then Senator Joe Biden is impressive.
We found it interesting that the phrase she often quotes actually came from a woman fighting for equal rights in 1873, named Sarah Grimke. “I ask no favor for my sex. All I ask of my brethren is that they take their feet off our necks.” And, unfortunately, it’s still applicable today as women continue to fight inequality. And Bader Ginsburg is still fighting, saying she has no intention of stepping down as long as she can do her job.
This documentary is well paced with an inordinate amount of archive footage organized showing so much early life of the Justice and her rise to prominence and popularity. The moniker “Notorious RBG” was put up on Tumbler as a hashtag. She says they have something in common. They both come from Brooklyn. And she’s become so popular, a feature film sin the works.
Cohen and West say that as they were shooting the film, Bader Ginsburg obviously began to trust them more and would give them permission to shoot more of her private time. So we get a more intimate portrait and even more insight seeing her close personal relationship with her granddaughter, who calls her Bubbie.
Much of the film shows Bader Ginsberg making personal appearances where she’s treated as a rock star, especially by young women. She is an inspiration to so many of all ages. When asked when she’ll retire, she’ll demure, as long as she can go “full steam.” This film is not only a portrait of a life well lived, but of someone who continues to keep fighting.
Magnolia Pictures 137 minutes PG Reviewed May 4, 2018
