Exoticalot
People are voting emotionally.
Matrixiole
Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.
Bea Swanson
This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.
ironhorse_iv
This Film à clef is clearly thinly disguised as a stand in for Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential primary election campaign. Not even the book written by an anonymous author can hide the facts that it's closely mirrors Bill Clinton's attempt to win over the people dismight conflicts such as his affairs, his participation in Vietnam War era protest, and others. Every thing about the film, just about speaks of him, even the actor playing an Southern governor Jack Stanton (John Travolta) who mimics the president southern drawn, and charm. It's hard not to see him in Jack. The movie starts with an idealistic former congressional worker, Henry Burton AKA George Stephanopoulos (Adrian Lester), whom joins the campaign whoms been impressed by Stanton's genuine warmth and empathy with people. He joins Stanton's inner circle of political advisers: Stanton's formidable wife, Susan Stanton AKA Hillary Clinton (Emma Thompson). Emme Thompson plays the shrewdness role well, as a women whom dreams and hope are riding on a man whom does mistake after mistake, nearly derailing his chances to be president. She doesn't mind chewing him out or bailing him. She always doesn't mind the womanizing that takes it's toll on her, as long as she wins in the end. Henry also meets ruthless, redneck political strategist Richard Jemmons AKA James Carville (Billy Bob Thornton) whom character is so unlikeable, it's hurt the film. The character is too mopey, drunk, sexual harasser and indecisive that it doesn't match the entertaining Carville of the documentary "The War Room,". It's not Carville. It's a downer character nobody ask for. Lastly he meets tough, but unbalanced Libby Holden AKA Betsey Wright/ Vince Foster (Kathy Bates.) Kathy Bates gives one of her best performance in this role, as she able to show strong emotion when needed, while also breaking down heart-broken. The film get good when tackles Henry and Libby are forced to seek out information about a rival politician. It's really shows how deep, far and twisted, people will go to dig to make sure their candidate wins while also showing how deeply disillusioned, they can be with the whole political process. Thus is each character tested: Do we do the right thing for the wrong reason, the wrong thing for the right reason? How low do we go? If we go too low, can we ever get back up? Both of them are forced to choose between idealism and realism when looking up and helping out a political contender. Kathy Bates' Libby Holden is the movie's most outstanding character and the one who most stirringly articulates its frustrations about the candidate. The film's single best and most serious scene, arriving in its abruptly melodramatic third act, finds Libby desperately begging the Stantons to assess their campaign ethics. It's heart breaking speech is brilliant. The satire film does a good job following the book's plot. I think Joe Klein would be proud. Oops-- I meant the anonymous author. Much of the charm of the Mike Nichols film is just looking at the array of vivid caricatures actor playing real-life people, but it's lacks to give us a great main character. Henry is a bland, passive presence occupying a good deal of screen time. Adrian Lester is great, but it's doesn't have that George Stephanopoulos charm to him. The boy scout works for a while, he knows Stanton is somewhat a phony since the beginning, but it's doesn't seem to matter to him. So why does the political process makes him disillusioned, if he knew all the long that this might be stressful? He knew what he was putting himself in. I guess he didn't know how much he was willing to take. It suppose to be by the end time, he comes a time when he must make peace with the idea that the purest of causes may be advanced by the most impure of champions, but he knew that before getting in. This is what hurts the film. It's not like Mr. Smith goes to Washington here, he knew in advance, how ugly it is. Does he change it for the better? No. Does he keep his moral ground? No. Henry doesn't learn anything new, but he does get a new job. The movie is slow-pace, funny at times, but hard to watch, cause how depressing it is. It exposes politics for what it is. A ugly, disgusting, game where idealism is crush, disappointment kicks in, and when you come out of it. You feel like you tired of it. That's what happen to the film. It gets tiresome after one watch. It's like the elections. Good for one night every four years.
secondtake
Primary Colors (1998)This starts off really great, and gets the flavor of a real campaign, without too much Hollywood hype (campaigns have their own kind of falseness, which is played up here). John Travolta not only hits it just right as a feeling and determined candidate, he also nails Bill Clinton pretty well, too. I don't suppose Emma Thompson is supposed to match Hillary quite as well, but she's a perfect running mate, and throw in Billy Bob (Thornton) as a sidekick and you have a really solid working trio. But it doesn't quite keep the focus or momentum, or honesty, of the opening scenes. Or humor, sometimes. (This is a comedy, by the way, and director Mike Nichols knows comedy, as does his screenwriter and longtime collaborator, Elaine May. They used to do stand up comedy together in the 1950s!) What begins as a kind of revelation and interior exploration digresses into more and more clichés of what campaigns do, and what they have to do (sleaze wise) to succeed. We know this stuff. It isn't the facts that enchant us, it's the exceptions to the facts, and it's the nuances between them. It never quite flags, though twenty minutes less screen time sounded good by the end. And Travolta and Thompson hold up their roles consistently.The real saving grace in the second half is the bursting on the scene of Kathy Bates, who is herself at her best. It might be the best Kathy Bates Kathy Bates has ever done, including some impassioned, tearful stuff. The opposing candidate is remarkably convincing--you even want to vote for him--played by Larry Hagman. On the other hand, the young clerk and campaign manager Adrian Lester is a bit too restrained and dull to make him even noticeable.Nichols is best when he gets two or three or four people interacting as real people, with flaws and intensity and passion (as in "The Graduate" and "Closer"). And those moments here are terrific, and sometimes hilarious, and make the rest easily worthwhile.
evanston_dad
What on paper sounds like the ingredients of a smart, snappy political satire instead makes for an over-long and lifeless dud of a movie.Mike Nichols directs John Travolta and Emma Thompson as a political couple clearly modeled on Bill and Hillary Clinton as they make their bid for President and First Lady of the U.S. But the movie has no spark at all, and it drifts aimlessly and lethargically to its conclusion.The only person who is able to breathe some life into the proceedings is Kathy Bates as a firecracker of a political consultant. Once she departs the film, her presence is sorely missed.Grade: C-
scubergmu
First of all, I gotta say that I love it when Hollywood takes on political subject matter, because it almost is always so rife with liberal wishful thinking. Maybe Bulworth wasn't, but when I think about this movie, The Contender, & The American President, its always so cute to see Democrats in charge & the only question of which way to proceed is one made within the party's ranks. I'll be honest, I sure wish that things were more like that. However out in the real world, the actual American President doesn't care about guns or global warming, there could never be an atheist contender for the Vice Presidency, and getting the Democratic nomination is not THE major obstacle to becoming the next President. Did you notice how that last fantasy listed was the one that occurred in Primary Colors? Republicans were never even shown in the movie, just mentioned a couple of times. By the end, we saw a candidate have the Democratic nomination in the bag, and then it flashed to a scene of him dancing at his inaugural ball. When you look back over the last 40 years (as of 2008), you see that Democrats have occupied the White House for 12 of them, or 30% of the time. So when are these Hollywood writers gonna start acknowledging that fact? As I watch the film now, I am just constantly reminded of how very different everything is in politics from the 90's to today. This movie was all about Democrats vying for the White House. And how much of the policy talk in this movie involved national security and military issues? None as far as I could tell. As long as the Democrats continue to be the mommy party, talking about nothing but education & health care, they're going to be either the minority party, or really close to it, forever. Now I did enjoy the movie, and the performances were excellent, especially from Adrian Lester and Kathy Bates. The whole film was essentially a chronicle of how a politician could be so brilliant and such a bright, shiny hero to the people at times, and also a low-down lecherous screwup at other times. I like that sort of depiction of people in stories & movies. And it is truly the Bill Clinton story. One biographer called him the Michael Jordan of politics, and yet most people remember him more for his womanizing. Bill Clinton may have been a flawed guy, but at least he was an interesting and brilliant political figure. And he does make for an interesting character study. It is just a shame that in this country, interesting Democrats hardly ever get elected President. They just don't appeal to the American people the way cookie-cutter Republicans can.
