All the King's Men (10 September 2007)
directed by Steven Zaillian
starring Sean Penn, Jude Law, Anthony Hopkins, Kate Winslet, Mark Ruffalo, Patricia Clarkson, James Gandolfini, Jackie Earle Haley, Kathy Baker, Lucy Stark, Travis Champagne, Luke Morris
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MPAA rating: Studio: Columbia Pictures, Phoenix Pictures, AKM Productions Script: Steven Zaillian Based on the book by: Robert Penn Warren Music: James Horner Running time: 128 minutes Tags: 1930s; Drama; government corruption; Louisiana; novel adaptation; Politics; Remake; suicide Tactical strength: [3/10]
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for an intense sequence of violence, sexual content and partial nudity
I could understand remaking a movie that did fairly well but had some obvious flaws that merited improvement. But I don't understand trying to remake an Oscar-winning film and expecting that the result could even come close to the original. And I really don't understand funding such a venture. Nevertheless, Steven Zaillian has written a new screenplay based on Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men and created a miserable, dull, slow, abomination.
Willie Stark (Sean Penn) works as a city treasurer in a small Louisiana town. He tried to bring public notice to the fact that the company awarded with the contract to build a new school would not use all the money for the project but would instead build an inferior building because of all the kickback money paid to the city council members that approved the bid. Jump ahead a few years, the school burns down, and three children die because of improperly installed fire escapes. Willie now gets a lot of press as the man who tried to prevent the corruption that would have saved the children. State politicos approach Willie and ask him to run for Governor. It doesn't take Willie long to realize that the politicos only wanted him to split the "cracker" vote and ensure the election of their preferred pro-business, pro-establishment candidate. Willie makes a break with his political backers and starts his own grass-roots campaign promising depression era workers better pay, better schools, and more bridges. I don't know why he promised so many bridges -- perhaps for the jobs the projects would create. Willie wins the election by a landslide.
Jack Burden (Jude Law) starts out as a young newspaper reporter following local politics. He covered the small town news when Willie tried to point out local corruption, and Jack seems to follow Willie's career through the election. For some reason when Willie offers Jack a job as a political advisor, Jack accepts. Willie believes that dirt exists about everyone, and he uses that dirt to coerce people into agreeing with his policies. Jack seems to do most of the digging for the dirt.
Interspersed through the main storyline, we see flashbacks of Jack's life. Jack's father died early in Jack's childhood, and Judge Irwin (Anthony Hopkins) a family friend took the place as a father figure in Jack's life. Jack grew up with the Stanton children Adam (Mark Ruffalo) and Anne (Kate Winslet) as constant companions. Several times the film flashes back to an evening with Jack, Adam, and Anne as late teenagers on the lake shore. They have gone swimming and Anne decides to go back in the water. We see this scene at least four times. Usually repeating a scene works if the viewer has new information and can view the scene from a new perspective, but Zaillian seem to use the scene just to remind us that Jack had lustful feelings toward Anne. Generally, the flashbacks do nothing but provide long breaks between the main story.
Before the theatrical release, I read bits and pieces of reviews that made it sound like All the Kings Men would sweep the Academy Awards. I don't know who could have thought this, except for possibly an optimistic marketing writer. Sean Penn's performance goes beyond caricature all the way into lampoon. No one could take this man seriously. He clearly knows what the people want but has no idea about how to accomplish anything except by the same means as the corrupt governor he replaces. Willie clearly doesn't care about the means and only cares about the end.
And with all the talk about Willie, you might think of him as the protagonist, but really Jack fills that role. We never understand why Jack left his newspaper (where he received pressure to write along the paper's party line) for a job with the new governor (where he does the research that provides Willie with the dirt he needs to pressure people to perform along Willie's party line). Jack's big crisis comes as the legislature has started a motion to impeach Willie. Judge Irwin makes public statements that he agrees with the impeachment, and Willie orders Jack to dig up dirt on the Judge. Of course, Jack hesitates. First, because he doesn't believe that any dirt could exist about the highly moral Judge. Second, because why would he want to find dirt on his own godfather.
Inexplicably, Jack does the research and does find some dirt on the Judge. And even more inexplicably, he gives the information to Willie. We don't have any reason why Jack would want to support the governor over the Judge. In fact, nothing in the entire movie explains why Jack makes the choices he does. Willie we understand. He has the pulse of the people, and can run a really good political rally. He wants to get work done in a corrupt government, and he joins right in with the corruption as the only means he sees to achieve his liberal social programs.
Zaillian has littered his sets with black and white family photos, and he has Jack give meaningful looks at the photos as if he makes some new connection. This happens over and over, but looking at pictures of Jack, Adam, and Anne as children don't ever reveal anything beyond what we already know -- they spent a lot of time together as children and that Jack practically considers Adam and Anne his brother and sister. Ok, so maybe Jack feels wrong for having lustful thoughts for his quasi-sister, but that doesn't explain why he quits his newspaper job, takes up heavy drinking, working for a corrupt political figure, and raking up dirt on his own family. Playing Jack, Jude Law looks lost through the entire picture, and who could blame him if he must play such an unmotivated character.
All the Kings Men slowly drags from scene to scene, forward and back in time, without ever clarifying the characters' motivations. Even the sudden revelation at the end doesn't do much to change our view of what has happened. Terrible editing, overblown acting by Penn, and underdeveloped characterization make All the King's Men not worth seeing. The depth of character that earned Robert Penn Warren a Pulitzer prize never appears in Zaillian's emaciated screenplay and leaves us with a shallow, uninteresting film.
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