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"Remind Me Again
Why We're Remaking A
Classic Film?" |
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Directed by Steven
Zaillian- Written by
Steven Zaillian, Robert
Penn Warren
Starring Sean Penn,
Patricia Clarkson, James
Gandolfini, Jude Law,
Kate Winslet
Distributed by Columbia -
2006 - 120mins - Rated
PG13 |
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Jacob Hall's
Review
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D+ |
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All the king’s men could never put this
movie together again! |
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There.
I’ve been trying to think of a clever pun for one of my reviews for a
long time now. I tried to think of one for “Snakes on a Plane” and
“Cars,” but had nothing. I mention this because halfway through “All
the King’s Men” I had lost complete faith in the movie and my head was
swimming with clever things I could put in this review. That opening
quote is the only one I could dig up.
“All the King’s Men” is an absolute disaster on most levels. It may
have been able to scrape by just being mediocre if everyone involved
was not filling every moment with typical Oscar fare pretentiousness.
Sean Penn stars as Willie Stark, a character who is among the greatest
in American literature. Jude Law is Jack Burden, the narrator who
watches Stark win the governorship of Louisiana and then loses his
soul.
I read Robert Penn Warren’s novel about a year ago and it was one of
those novels I had to force myself to finish, but when I did, I found
that I was glad I read it because as a whole, it is an extraordinary
work of art. So perhaps I walked into this one with hopes far too high
than I should have.
Before I get to the film, I feel that I have to compare the novel to
another completely different one: James Ellroy’s “L.A. Confidential.”
I mention this because these are both incredibly dense, incredibly
complicated books that appear to be unadaptable. The reason the
screenplay for the “L.A. Confidential” film is so remarkable is that
it only takes the bare bones structure of an incredibly detailed plot,
but keeps the character arcs and emotional connection of the book
completely intact.
I say this because this is the main problem with “All the King’s Men.”
It tries so desperately and in the process, half-assedly, to maintain
every plot and subplot of the novel. We get all of the characters and
storylines, but none are given the attention that they need to make
them effective. For example, we get the subplot involving Jack
Burden’s relationship with his childhood love (Kate Winslet), but this
probably gets five minutes in a two and half hour movie. The entire
film is filled with this: characters who never come full circle and
stories that never pay off.
Also, the point of the story is that Stark is a decent man who
transforms into a monster. The film spends no time with this change.
It just happens.
Poorly paced storytelling is a killer in a film that wants to win
awards, but the even bigger killer is some absolutely abysmal acting
by a group of thespians that is normally brilliant. Sean Penn should
have been great in this role, but he is just embarrassing to watch,
complete with an accent straight from community theatre and CONSTANT
wild hand gestures that makes Willie Stark look like a descendent of
Captain Jack Sparrow. Jude Law gives the best performance in the
movie, but he seems oddly detached the entire time. Kate Winslet does
nothing by look pretty (which she is always good at) and Mark
Ruffalo’s part has been cut down so much that he barely leaves a mark
on the entire film. Even worse than Penn, however, are James
Gandolfini, Patricia Clarkson and Anthony Hopkins, three normally
brilliant actors who mangle accents and just embarrass themselves.
Steve Zaillian, who has written a handful of good screenplays, has a
lot of good shots and scenes…some of the cinematography is beautiful
and some of the scenes, particularly the last one, show real cinematic
craft.
Overall, this is a mess of film. Considering that this was supposed to
be out a year ago but was held back to fix problems, this is
undoubtedly the best product they could have created with what was
filmed.
I really wish it was better. |
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© Written by Jacob Hall -
Email
Me! |
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How We Rated This Film
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TC Candler -
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| Richard Propes
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Jacob Hall
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D+ |
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TC Candler's Comment
n/a
Richard Propes' Comment
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