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A Disappointing Continuation

Blistering performances.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Competing for their party's presidential nomination, two popular United States politicians consider using underhanded slander tactics to gain an advantage in this scathing look at the American political process. The presidential hopefuls are played by Henry Fonda and Cliff Robertson respectively, however, the best performance in the film comes from Lee Tracy who received an Oscar nomination for his role as the cynical, terminally ill incumbent president who cannot decide whether the unadventurous Fonda or the spineless Robertson is better to endorse. Full of moralistic dialogue, the film feels a little preachy at times and Fonda and Robertson are painted a little too much like polar opposites for credibility, but either way, the film offers a memorable insight into dirty politics and the systems in place that breed dirty politics. There is great irony in how Fonda and Robertson spend more time working out whether or not to take down one another than they do on debating issues and policies at hand. There is also much to consider with Tracy equating Fonda making a decision on whether to take down Robertson at the same level of making a political decision in the best interest of the nation. The film has curious time capsule status too these days, or at least in terms of the tactic proposed in order to take Robertson down. Times have certainly changed, but have politics changed that much?

Gore Vidal, always one of our more honest and entertaining political insiders, provides a typically critical look at the closeted skeletons and backstabbing power plays behind a national presidential convention, where Henry Fonda and a young Cliff Robertson square off for their party's nomination. Fonda, more or less typecast as the more rational candidate, plays an admirable but unexciting character surrounded (thankfully) by a gallery of colorful eccentrics bordering on, but never quite reaching, the level of caricature. Chief among them is his rival, Robertson, a sleazy right-wing demagogue modeled, according to the author, after Richard Nixon, although his paranoid tirades would fit comfortably anywhere in the shallow soapbox of post-Reagan political discourse. Oscar nominee Lee Tracy and comedian Shelley Berman lend memorable support, but the real star of the film is Vidal's barbed wit and malicious political insight, none of which has aged a day, even while the old-style national convention depicted here has long since devolved into a meaningless charade of choreographed soundbites and corporate slogans.

A great movie of Gore Vidal's incendiary play. Henry Fonda and Cliff Robertson vie for the presidential nomination and what takes place during the hours leading up to the nomination is seedy, dynamic and always riveting. Fonda is the Adlai Stevenson-nice-guy-as-politician while Robertson is surely modeled after Nixon (and an already desperately despicable Nixon). Lee Tracy is a former President brought into to jar Fonda into reality and to teach him just how to fight dirty. He's a force to be reckoned with and his scenes are dynamite. Fonda is his typical stalwart self and Robertson chews the scenery (to his advantage) as his cunning adversary. Director Franklin Schaffner moves the film at a breathless pace. He would never again direct a film this subtle. Ultimately, it is an actor's film with Margaret Leighton, Ann Sothern and, best of all, Shelley Berman (as a real red herring) offering terrific support. Edie Adams plays Robertson's supportive wife and Kevin McCarthy plays a hard-nosed politico.

Very well done movie, giving us a flavor of the classic political conventions of the past. Fonda does a great job as usual, but Cliff Robertson is simply electric as Joe Cantwell. Hollywood being Hollywood though, the conservative candidate is disparagingly portrayed. Nothing much changes does it?The black and white photography is first rate. Fonda's idealism is typical of candidates who want a new approach to politics. As shown, the process itself corrupts the idealistic candidate; compromises have to be made, promises dealt out, and eventually deals have to be made with the devil. The sitting president, played by Lee Tracy, shows a world weary cynicism about the process, which Fonda and Robertson haven't yet grasped. Excellent film.