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Honest, brave, modest: why the world can't get enough of Tom Hanks

Directors, critics – even a president – have hailed the actor’s qualities, and his latest movie sees them all present and correct

A crowd stands, spellbound, in a muddy square in northern Texas, firelight flickering on the faces in the evening darkness. A newspaper story is being read aloud by a lone speaker, and each man and woman strains to hear the words, mouths twitching with effort and emotion. It is a news report that tells of a group of miners in peril, trapped underground elsewhere, in some other benighted place.

It is an unusual scene of the sort that would perhaps be summoned up by a film director who earned his spurs in the world of news and current affairs. And it’s true, News of the World, a poignant western, was directed by Paul Greengrass, alumni of British television’s old World in Action team and a big believer in the power of good reporting. But there is another reason for the rapt attention of this grimy audience: they are all listening to the voice of Tom Hanks, the nearest the liberal west has to a secular evangelist.

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from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2YuG9xD
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