Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, A (2019) review

Esquire Magazine sends one of its most jaded reporters, Lloyd Vogel (Matthew Rhys) - based on actual writer Tom Junod - to do a piece on Fred Rogers (Tom Hanks), a beloved children's show host, and while at first he's skeptical of Rogers and his too-kind-to-be-human demeanor, he eventually succumbs to the warmth.  It's a shame Heller had to turn this into a Christian Psychoanalytic Session ("everything mentionable is manageable"), because Hanks is just remarkable as Rogers - he gets all the little details right, down to the calm smile and the cadence - and even acts as a "healer" for Lloyd by patching up the broken relationship he had with his estranged father (Chris Cooper) who abandoned him (and his mother) decades prior.  Yes, it's sappy, but several moments indicate Rogers struggled with his calling: as his wife says, he had to work at it.  And of course there's that "burden" question that never gets directly answered....