The Ides of March (Dir. George Clooney 2011)- Grade: B+
Ides is a very capable movie. I mean that in the sense that it is just good at everything. The story is interesting and takes realistic yet surprising twists. It's just a real good political espionage film. It features a very strong cast. Clooney plays a role very polarizing to the one he plays in The Descendants which shows how impressive he was in The Descendants more than anything. Ryan Gosling continues to show why he owned 2011 with another strong showing. They then round out the cast with a menacing Paul Giamatti (probably the best kind of Giamatti), a no nonsense Phillip Seymour Hoffman (the subplot of Hoffman and Giamatti essentially playing the angle and devil on Gosling's character's shoulder is maybe the best part of the movie), and Marisa Tomei as a reporter willing to get the story no matter what.
It's weaknesses are small but mainly revolved around Clooney's behind the camera work. It clearly had a strong story that it was based off of so it's too bad the writing wasn't handled by a more accomplished writer that would know how to really turn the story into something more memorable (think what Sorkin did with The Social Network) instead of just kind of fall short or greatness like Clooney and Grant Heslov's writing does. The directing falls into the same category. It was fine but Clooney too often went for the epic and it ended up just looking like he was forcing it. At times it was like he was trying to make a modern day Citizen Kane by just doing the exact same things as Citizen Kane (the argument Gosling and Hoffman have behind the American flag backdrop for instance). Still though you have a good movie with a good cast. It won't be remembered five years from now like the rest of the good movies to come out this last year, but it's still a lot better than most generic looking political films that come out.
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