‘Lilly’ Review: Equal-Pay Activist and Trailblazer Lilly Ledbetter Deserves a Much Better Film

variety.com:

Tomris Laffly It’s ordinary people, and not superheroes, who bring about justice and change in the real world. In “Lilly,” writer-director Rachel Feldman follows the era-defining work of one such everyday woman: trailblazer Lilly Ledbetter, a pioneer from humble beginnings who took her employer, Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co., to court on the basis of gendered pay discrimination.

But while Ledbetter’s contributions toward the fight for equal pay are immortalized with the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 (which essentially states that each unfair paycheck starts a new cycle of discrimination), her legacy sadly doesn’t receive the polished and sophisticated treatment that it deserves in “Lilly,” a puzzling film that can’t decide what it wants to be.

The unfortunate inelegance of Feldman’s film announces itself right at the start, as the movie struggles to establish its tone as a narrative feature that heavily leans into documentary footage.

We witness Ledbetter, played timidly by Patricia Clarkson, take the stage at the 2008 Democratic Convention right before President Obama’s election.