All the King's Men

Director:  Robert Rossen
Year Released:  1949
Rating:  2.5

The assault on the classics continues! “All the King’s Men” is widely considered one of the greatest films ever made by the AFI, film historians and the like, but I found it wanting in many areas. Perhaps my argument against the film is tainted by the fact that I was born in the late seventies and am a card-carrying member of Generation X, and that the political films I most identify with are the recent “Primary Colors,” “Nixon,” “JFK” etc. I dunno … I’m not sure I can accurately critique this movie because of the context I’m viewing it in – had I seen this in the late 40s when it was made, I may have given it a higher rating. But as it stands, this fictionalized account of the life of Huey Long is chock-full of problems, most notable of which is the lack-of-acting-talent exhibited by two of the main characters (the narrator and his “girlfriend”). Other issues I had with it: the “distance” the director takes from the material (everyone in the film is corrupt in some way – who to identify with?), the enigma Willie Stark (played well by Broderick Crawford) remains for the entire running time (what turns him from honest family man to a corrupt Machiavellian conniver, anyway?), the weak ending (assassinated in front of the courthouse … how symbolic) and the erratic pacing. Don’t take it from this brief summary that the whole work is a complete bust – au contraire. It looks good, is professionally done and some of the performances (Crawford and Mercedes McCambridge) are worth watching. But for the most part, I wasn’t satisfied with the movie as a whole.

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