Video Review |
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Video Review |
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Last Updated 12/06/00
Email: robitai@our-town.com
Taking a Break from Too Close to Call
Just when you thought it was safe to
turn on your television, to sort your junk mail, or to drive down a Texas roadway, it's
too close to call. If you've found yourself
short-circuited by the election non-results, turn to the vicarious experience of the
movies. Here are two suggestions for Robert
Redford films that will whet your political appetite and give you more than enough fodder
for threshing out the dividends of absentee voting.
Robert Redford did more than his share in the 70s to make political statements by
starring in both THE CANDIDATE (1972) and ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN (1976).
THE CANDIDATE has a decidedly dated
kind of Austin Powers feel that makes watching it somehow satisfying. These are the "good old days" when life
looked complicated, but free. Redford plays
Bill McKay, a blond California lawyer with lots of chutzpa who takes great delight
in swimming upstream. His "in your face
efforts" to dismantle the California Democratic political machine create the movie's
major conflicts.
He decides to run for Senate only
when the campaign director Marvin Lucas (Peter Boyle) offers him the chance to run the
campaign the way he wants to. The election
pits McKay against an unbeatable opponent, and once he becomes embroiled in the campaign,
his notions of fair play and honest delivery come under scrutiny. It's a movie that unfolds slowly, and
surprises come in odd places.
Looking
back now through thirty years of hindsight wrought with political scandals, public
embarrassments, and voting irregularities too numerous to count can make even Watergate
begin to pale. If you want to return to the
days when scandal wasn't so straightforward as it has been of late, watch the 1976
political thriller ALL THE KING'S MEN. Here Redford's paired with the charismatic Dustin
Hoffman, and the chemistry works. Redford and
Hoffman portray the real-life reporting duo of Bob Woodward (Redford) and Carl Bernstein
(Hoffman).
If
you remember your history lessons, you know that Woodward and Bernstein managed against
all odds to unravel the details of the infamous Watergate cover-up. Their effective detective work ultimately led to
the resignation of President Nixon. Their
roles in the scandal began innocently enough: with a newspaper story for the Washington
Post about a burglary at the Democratic Party National headquarters in the Watergate
Hotel. This thriller takes you through the
painstaking twists and turns as the bulldog team of Woodward and Bernstein ferret out the
truth that topples the Nixon administration.
So switch from CNN to your video. At least when the political confusion unfolds on
the video, you can hit the pause button and go to the kitchen for a sandwich.
Both movies are available in video and dvd.