The Presidency
Through a Cinematic Lens
Historical judgments are best made from the safe distance of many centuries. With that caveat, it is reasonably safe to say that no one has done more to reshape the modern presidency than Donald Trump. While we can only imagine how his impact will be portrayed on film in the future, we can look back at how the office has been depicted over time.
Frank Capra's 1948 film, State of the Union, featuring Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, and Angela Lansbury, remains relevant today as it delves into how idealism is often influenced and exploited by those with a vested interest in political outcomes. Similar to Capra's Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) and Meet John Doe (1941), the character Mathew Grant, portrayed by Spencer Tracy, grapples with the conflict between his idealism and the practicalities of modern politics.
Thursday, May 21st
All the King's Men
In 1949, Columbia Studios released All The King’s Men, written, produced, and directed by Robert Rossen. The movie was based on Robert Penn Warren's 1946 novel of the same name, which focused on the political career of Huey Long, who served as the 40th governor of Louisiana from 1928 to 1932 and as a United States senator from 1932 until his assassination in 1935.
All the King's Men follows the trajectory of Willie Stark, the protagonist, from an idealistic country lawyer to a populist demagogue whose supporters are willing to resort to violence to thwart his impeachment. The film and the book have garnered increasing attention since the events of January 6, 2021, when a populist mob attacked the nation's capital. This has prompted many to ask how a demagogue can influence citizens to flout the most fundamental norms of a democratic society.
How to Watch
Reviews
Paul Batters, May, 2018
Brian Neve, Cineaste, 2026
Will Neill, Cherwell, 2021
IMDb, All the King's Men: Trivia
Thursday, May 28th
The Manchurian Candidate
The Manchurian Candidate, based on the 1959 novel by Richard Condon and directed by John Frankenheimer, was released in 1962, starring Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, and Angela Lansbury.
The movie’s title quickly entered the political lexicon, reflecting the fear and frenzy of the McCarthy Era and Cold War preoccupation with Communist subterfuge. As recently as the Obama and Trump administrations, its specter has risen with accusations of foreign influence in presidential elections.
“The Manchurian Candidate feels astonishingly contemporary; its astringent political satire still bites, and its story has uncanny contemporary echoes. The villains plan to exploit a terrorist act, ‘rallying a nation of viewers to hysteria, to sweep us up into the White House with powers that will make martial law seem like anarchy.’” Roger Ebert
June 4th
The Best Man
The Best Man, released in 1964 and directed by Franklin J. Schaffner with a screenplay by Gore Vidal, is based on Vidal’s 1960 play of the same name. The movie portrays two flawed presidential candidates: one liberal, William Russell, played by Henry Fonda, and one conservative, Senator Joe Cantwell, played by Cliff Robertson, neither of whom can stand the other. Cantwell attempts to sabotage Russell’s campaign, threatening to release embarrassing details from Russell’s personal life. Russell can retaliate with equally devastating information he has on Cantwell. In the end, the best man steps back from the brink, preserving his personal integrity but in a devastating way for his rival.
It is very easy to view a film like The Best Man as quaint, but the reality is that politics and, perhaps more importantly, politicians, seldom change when it comes to mudslinging and competitiveness.
Jacob deBlecourt, "Anthology of Awful: Political Nostalgia in Film"
June 11th
The Candidate
The Candidate, released in 1972 by Warner Brothers, and directed by Michael Ritchie, is based on a screenplay by Jeremy Larner. The movie follows the political journey of a reluctant, idealistic candidate, Bill McKay (played by Robert Redford), who is persuaded by political operative Marvin Lucas (played by Peter Boyle) to run as the Democratic candidate for Senate in California, a race assumed to be unwinnable.
'"The Candidate…presents us with various individual lessons … the overall gist of which is that it’s not enough actually to be an attractive, smart young idealist; you need to become “the attractive, smart young idealist,” i.e. a certain media type that voters will recognize as such. The satirical point, you might say, is that creating even a true image takes careful crafting, and that this process has an undertow—the crafting itself induces cynicism, thus making the image at least a bit less true.
Megan Garber, September 26, 2016.
The Atlantic
Thursday, June 18th
The War Room
“Filmed by the veteran documentarian D.A. Pennebaker and his wife, Chris Hegedus, the movie follows key members of Bill Clinton’s campaign team from the snows of New Hampshire in January 1992 to the victory celebration in Little Rock in November of that year. The movie’s stars are James (“The Ragin’ Cajun”) Carville, the impish chief strategist for the Clinton campaign, and George Stephanopoulos, the young, polished former Rhodes scholar who was the campaign’s media director.”
Roger Ebert, January 1994
Thursday, June 25th
Primary Colors
Primary Colors, directed by Mike Nichols with a screenplay by Elaine May, was adapted from Joe Klein’s 1996 roman à a clef, Primary Colors: A Novel of Politics and stars John Travolta as President Jack Stanton and Emma Thompson as his wife, Susan.
“This film does more than just poke fun at the Clintons. It evolves into a neat examination of the power of the American media machine and its insatiable appetite for political intrigue, an appetite which leaves it vulnerable to manipulation by skilled political operatives as well as anyone wanting to become famous by hurling mud at people in power.” Fred Harvey: The History Place
Thursday, July 2nd
The American President
The American President, produced and directed by Rob Reiner and written by Aaron Sorkin, stars Michael Douglas as President Andrew Shepherd, a widower who pursues a relationship with environmental lobbyist Sydney Ellen Wade (Annette Bening) – who has just moved to Washington, D.C. – while at the same time attempting to win the passage of a crime control bill during a re-election year. Martin Sheen, Michael J. Fox, and Richard Dreyfuss star in supporting roles. The screenplay for the film inspired many aspects of Sorkin's later television drama, The West Wing. The two productions follow the staff of a largely idealized White House and share ideologies like many of Sorkin's projects.
The American President - Wikipedia.
Thursday, July 9th
Wag The Dog
Wag the Dog, directed by Barry Levinson in 1998, features a screenplay by David Mamet and Hilary Henkin, based on a book by Larry Beinhart. If, at first glance, the premise that the American public will accept even the most absurd of fabricated government pronouncements with enthusiasm may seem overstated, it has only increased its credibility with time. Beginning with Bill Clinton's Operation Infinite Reach,1998 Afghanistan/Sudan, Bush’s Operation Iraqi Freedom, 2003 Iraq, Obama’s Operation Odyssey Dawn, 2011 Lybia, and Trump's assassination of Iran's General Qasem Soleimani, 2020, the American public has developed a heightened degree of skepticism about the necessity, if not the motivation, for foreign military interventions. Indeed, the phrase, wag at the dog, has entered our political lexicon for this very reason.
Thursday, July 16th
Man of The Year
Man of the Year, a 2006 Universal Studios release, was directed and written by Barry Levinson and starred Robin Williams, Christopher Walken, Laura Linney, Jeff Goldblum, and Lewis Black. Man of the Year was the third collaboration between Barry Levinson and Robin Williams. Whereas Good Morning Vietnam (1987) enjoyed critical success, Toys (1992) and Man of the Year received poor reviews and were unsuccessful at the box office. In the case of Man of the Year, however, time has treated the film well. Whereas in 2006, the idea of a satirical news program commentator running for president seemed a step too far, in light of the elections of 2016 and 2020, the concept of Robbin Williams's character, Tom Dobbs, running and possibly winning the presidency is not so far-fetched.