Movie Review: ‘The Ides of March’

The Ides of March a well-told tale of filthy politics and betrayal, is a virtuoso hat trick (writing, directing, and starring) by George Clooney. It makes you wish he’d stop acting and run for office. But then we wouldn’t get these top-grade films.

Based on the play “Farragut North” (in turn, loosely based on Howard Dean’s 2004 presidential run), The Ides of March tells the story of whip-smart but idealistic campaign press secretary Stephen Myers (an excellent Ryan Gosling), who, much like the proverbial slowly boiled frog, suddenly finds himself up to his neck in a political scandal.

Myers works for liberal presidential candidate Governor Mike Morris (Clooney), who’s so far to the left that the collective far-right-wing pundits would all be in danger of spontaneously combusting just by looking at him.

Amid the crazed latter days of a hotly contested Ohio presidential primary, Myers and the governor’s campaign manager, Paul Zara (Philip Seymour Hoffman), find themselves brilliantly sabotaged by the opposing camp’s campaign manager, Tom Duffy (the peerless Paul Giamatti), in a chess grandmaster-worthy sneak attack.

To make matters worse, Myers is seduced by a fellow staffer, the nepotistic intern Molly Stearns (Evan Rachel Wood), whose serial seductions end up backfiring on her and blowing back on Myers, in highly dramatic fashion.
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He comes face to face, via a dunking in seriously dirty politics, with his integrity, his ambition, and ultimately, his core truths.

George Clooney, like other triple-threat showbiz moguls who speak articulately about politics and seem like good guys (Warren Beatty, Clint Eastwood, and Robert Redford come to mind), is one of those actors people tend to wish would enter politics for real. However, Clooney famously would rather play a governor than actually run for office. This vehicle perfectly brings his career, his talent, and his passionate “hobby” together. It’s the best of both worlds for him—and for us moviegoers.

Shot in grays and blues with a muted, largely string and piano soundtrack, external impressions mirror the coldness of heart that ultimately subjugates the heat of passion for power, in order to do the despicable. In our present political powder-keg period, the deadly mind games on display here make one shudder at the lack of human kindness in them.

In The Godfather, we witnessed Michael Corleone spend his life running from the sins of his father, only, in the end, to be wrapped in their black cloud and cut off forever from his good side. In a tribute to the chilling change that came over Michael as he assumed the cloak of his father’s corrupting power, we see that same thousand-yard stare announce the moral implosion of a key player in Clooney’s film.

Likewise, there’s a tribute to those horror films in which the monster can regenerate in entirety from a small, cut-off piece of itself. Watch for it, it’s good.

There are obvious visual as well thematic nods to the 2008 Obama campaign, primarily in that the Donkeys are equated with hope, and the Elephants with fear.

However, the over-riding moral of the story is that, inevitably, regarding the highest aspects of human endeavor, if there is not exquisite vigilance, the lowest human foibles will almost always find a way to creep in and blow the house of cards down. Especially if the house of cards that’s being built is White.

[etRating value=“ 4”]