Post by petrolino on Apr 14, 2018 0:55:28 GMT
'All The President's Men' is a conspiracy thriller based on a book written by crusading journalists Carl Bernstein (played by Dustin Hoffman) and Bob Woodward (played by Robert Redford) who worked for news publication 'The Washington Post'. It concerns the 'Watergate' scandal of the 1970s.
'All The President's Men' is directed by Alan Pakula who was no stranger to conspiracy films having made 'Klute' (1971) and 'The Parallax View' (1974). All three of these thrillers are photographed by Gordon Willis - nicknamed "Master of Darkness" - who experiments with short-focus imagery in 'All The President's Men' to depict how a journalist enters a state of self-imposed isolation while sitting in a busy, bustling, open-plan office. Pakula mounts a paranoid night cruise under city lights early in the picture, set to composer David Shire's suspicious underscore, which culminates in a tense, carefully arranged meeting with dry informant Deep Throat (Hal Holbrook) who exhibits a nasty habit of lurking deep within the wrong kind of shadows. The two roving reporters become sleepless nightcrawlers as they push forward to record reliable sources and this allows Willis to enter into the darkness on many occasions.
This dangerous production's casting contains a conspiracy angle itself. Robert Redford had recently starred in Michael Ritchie's political satire 'The Candidate' (1972) and Sydney Pollack's conspiracy thriller 'Three Days Of The Condor' (1975), in addition to appearing in tricky capers 'The Hot Rock' (1972) and 'The Sting' (1973), all of which predict the kind of perplexing criminal angle he was now keen on taking. Dustin Hoffman would star in John Schlesinger's painful thriller 'The Marathon Man' (1976) around the same time as 'All The President's Men'. Pakula opted to bring in a pair of experienced performers who'd collaborate on a number of films directed by crime specialist Sidney Lumet in their careers, Martin Balsam and Jack Warden, co-stars in '12 Angry Men' (1957). Taking his role as producer very seriously, Redford was initially keen to cast Al Pacino to play Carl Bernstein, an actor fresh from making Lumet's crime pictures 'Serpico' (1973) and 'Dog Day Afternoon' (1975), but he realised Hoffman would be a better fit for this particular characterisation and I believe this decision was fully vindicated. Scene-stealer Ned Beatty would appear for Lumet in 'Network' (1976) this very same year and was fresh off the success of making Bud Yorkin's 'The Thief Who Came To Dinner' (1973).
I find 'All The President's Men' to be a thoughtful, intelligent and thoroughly absorbing crime procedural about the importance of a free press, independent reporting, journalistic integrity, newsroom solidarity and what journos sometimes refer to as literary "chutzpah". Dustin Hoffman constantly surprises as passionate pursuer Bernstein and Robert Redford delivers maximum suspense with his extraordinarily balanced portrayal of internally conflicted idealist Woodward.
'All The President's Men' is an influential film. A brief but memorable meeting on a park bench is referenced during Donald Sutherland's show-stopping turn in Oliver Stone's epic conspiracy thriller 'JFK' (1991). I think it's influence can also be detected in riveting investigative crime dramas like 'Absence Of Malice' (1981), 'The Mean Season' (1985), 'L.A. Confidential' (1997), 'Moving Targets' (1999), 'Nightcrawler' (2014) and 'Spotlight' (2015).
"I was so programmed to fail. I had shown no signs of talent as a young man. I was an editor at the school literary magazine at Oberlin College, and I would anonymously submit my short stories. When the other editors - two brilliant girls - would read them, they would say, 'We can't possibly publish this sh*t.' And I would agree. After that I took a creative-writing course, where I got horrible grades. Do you know what it's like to want to be a writer and get the worst grades in the class? It's terrible ... I had never seen a screenplay until I was 33. The first time I ever saw what a screenplay even looked like was when I bought a screenwriting guide at an all-night bookstore at midnight in Times Square."
- William Goldman, The Guardian
"Not unlike Roman Polanski’s unofficial "Apartment" Trilogy, Alan J. Pakula’s “Paranoia” Trilogy finds its three films united through a similar sense of mood and theme rather than a serialized story. Starting with 1971’s 'Klute', then 'The Parallax View' in 1974, and concluding in 1976 with 'All The President’s Men', the trio of films weave a palpable atmosphere of unease — often through the prism of political underpinnings — while following a protagonist’s dangerous journey through an realm of suspense and intrigue. Although 'Klute' situates itself firmly within the detective genre, the following films would inhabit specific arenas within the political thriller — escalating in scope each time — that address themes of grand conspiracy while suffocating the viewer in an atmosphere of dread."
- Nick Yarborough, 'On Pakula's "Paranoia" Trilogy'
"There is a certain apt irony to Alan Pakula’s own career. Here was a man responsible for some of the most highly regarded films of the seventies, and yet who himself remained something of a figure in the shadows. Unlike Scorsese, Altman and Ashby, with their much quoted problems with hash, coke and alcohol, Pakula was a behind the scenes auteur, someone who could shape the material to his own ends but didn’t expect to appear in the newspapers because of it. Describing his approach to filmmaking as oblique, he adds “I think it has to do with my own nature.” (The International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers.) “I like trying to do things which work on many levels, because I think it is terribly important to give an audience a lot of things they may not get as well those they will, so that the film finally does take on a texture and is not just simplistic communication.” This might all sound like preciousness were it not for the subject matter in his key works; it could seem like no more than a filmmaker aspiring to literary indirectness, to symbolism, metaphor and simile. But Pakula was grappling with the problem of communication where there weren’t simply power structures lording over people with great visibility; but power structures looming with much invisibility. Here the tools of metaphor can prove extremely useful as Pakula wonders how we live with the architecture we’re at the mercy of. As Robert Hughes says in his book, The Shock of the New, “building is the art we live; it is the social art par excellence, the carapace of political fantasy, the exoskeleton of one’s economic dreams.” However, as Pakula explores, it is also potentially the metaphorical site of our nightmares. It may be made in the image of man’s glory, but it can often feel as though its purpose is to diminish one’s stature."
- Tony McKibbin, 'Alan J. Pakula : The Architecture Of Power'
'Rescue Me' - Fontella Bass
'Moviedrome Introduction - 'The Parallax View' by Alex Cox
In 2010, 'All The President's Men' was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
"Is there any place you don't smoke?"
Donald Sutherland, Alan Pakula & Jane Fonda
Donald Sutherland, Alan Pakula & Jane Fonda
'All The President's Men' is directed by Alan Pakula who was no stranger to conspiracy films having made 'Klute' (1971) and 'The Parallax View' (1974). All three of these thrillers are photographed by Gordon Willis - nicknamed "Master of Darkness" - who experiments with short-focus imagery in 'All The President's Men' to depict how a journalist enters a state of self-imposed isolation while sitting in a busy, bustling, open-plan office. Pakula mounts a paranoid night cruise under city lights early in the picture, set to composer David Shire's suspicious underscore, which culminates in a tense, carefully arranged meeting with dry informant Deep Throat (Hal Holbrook) who exhibits a nasty habit of lurking deep within the wrong kind of shadows. The two roving reporters become sleepless nightcrawlers as they push forward to record reliable sources and this allows Willis to enter into the darkness on many occasions.
"Focusing on the first seven months of the Watergate scandal, All the President’s Men tells the story from the viewpoint of the journalists from The Washington Post who broke the story. Made when these events were still raw, the film provides a view of modern history that suggests the paranoid skeptics were right all along – and is widely considered to be one of the great American political thrillers."
- Jamie McLaren, The British Film Institute
"This is 'All the President’s Men', the story not of the Watergate scandal and Richard Nixon’s eventual resignation, but of Bob Woodward (Robert Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman), the Washington Post reporters who brought the story to light. It’s a tale of the pen being mightier than the sword, or more specifically the power of the written word, and of truth, in exposing the parts of our world that exist in the shadows. 'All the President’s Men' deals in those contrasts, the dichotomies of light and dark, truth and lies, public and private, what’s known and what’s unknown. And this is brought to the fore thanks to masterful visual storytelling, an amazing script and an incredible cast. Seriously, this film is the perfect storm of unbelievable talent. It is, unequivocally, a masterpiece, whatever your definition of the word might be.
From the typewritten opening shot, we then see news footage of Richard Nixon, all smiles as he’s applauded by congress, ready to address the people of America. We’re then plunged into the darkness of the Watergate break-in, the clandestine, criminal underbelly of the President’s public persona. Woodward and Bernstein themselves are a contrasting pair. One a handsome, blonde, Republican WASP only nine months into the job, the other a dark-haired, Jewish, liberal who was almost fired a month prior to the story. Their reporting styles are different, they don’t get along particularly, but the script and direction shows their remarkable growth as a duo, from initially being mistakenly called ‘Woodstein’, a single entity of so little importance to the Post’s upper echelons that their individual identities are irrelevant, to eventually being on the same wavelength to the point of finishing each other’s sentences (Redford and Hoffman learnt each other’s lines so they could do this at any point in the film)."
- Zooey Glass, Blueprint
"With the way “All the President’s Men” is shot and edited, there seems to be little exaggeration or hyperbole or sensationalism; it’s understated to allow for the happenings and the implications to grow more impactful on their own, essentially mimicking a documentary style of filmmaking. While the facts could have made for a James Bond-like thriller, the presentation is instead that of a newsroom procedural, with every event unfolding carefully, systematically, and without the over-the-top Hollywood standards of intensity – or even the loud, screeching violins that might be found in lesser pictures. Like the greatest of filmic mysteries, details are exhibited with precision to afford the audience the opportunity to learn and solve the case right alongside the journalists. And its unhurried divulgements generate a natural anticipation for bigger and bigger conclusions.
“Follow the money.” Amusingly, the politics in the media industry perpetually thwart tunneling to the considerably buried truth. The competition from the New York Times and other news companies is almost as big an opposition as the higher-ups in the Post, who don’t want to risk publishing a “dangerous” story without more than enough facts and sources. But both are piddling compared to the misplaced loyalties of the politicians and employees who are entrenched in the cover-up: ordinary people who want to help but are intimidated, surveilled, and threatened to keep quiet by a network of powerful, influential schemers.
On the acting front, Robert Redford and Hoffman are in top form. Their deliveries and interactions are incredibly natural – almost as if improvised – boasting reverse psychology and tricky interrogations that are inherently steeped in humor, thanks to the accidental information leaked or gleaned from every little conversation. William Goldman’s script is sensational to match, overflowing with wordy dialogues as if an in-depth news report on the investigation – but with the inherent theatrical suspense surrounding the inevitable exposure of a crime committed by the highest of powers (the kind where corruption becomes the scariest). With its potent plot, sensational performances, and riveting screenplay, “All the President’s Men” is one of the greatest of all political thrillers, setting a benchmark against which a wealth of films after it would be measured."
- Mike Massie, Gone With The Twins
Robert Redford & Dustin Hoffman
'Give It Up (Or Turn It Loose)' - James Brown
- Jamie McLaren, The British Film Institute
"This is 'All the President’s Men', the story not of the Watergate scandal and Richard Nixon’s eventual resignation, but of Bob Woodward (Robert Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman), the Washington Post reporters who brought the story to light. It’s a tale of the pen being mightier than the sword, or more specifically the power of the written word, and of truth, in exposing the parts of our world that exist in the shadows. 'All the President’s Men' deals in those contrasts, the dichotomies of light and dark, truth and lies, public and private, what’s known and what’s unknown. And this is brought to the fore thanks to masterful visual storytelling, an amazing script and an incredible cast. Seriously, this film is the perfect storm of unbelievable talent. It is, unequivocally, a masterpiece, whatever your definition of the word might be.
From the typewritten opening shot, we then see news footage of Richard Nixon, all smiles as he’s applauded by congress, ready to address the people of America. We’re then plunged into the darkness of the Watergate break-in, the clandestine, criminal underbelly of the President’s public persona. Woodward and Bernstein themselves are a contrasting pair. One a handsome, blonde, Republican WASP only nine months into the job, the other a dark-haired, Jewish, liberal who was almost fired a month prior to the story. Their reporting styles are different, they don’t get along particularly, but the script and direction shows their remarkable growth as a duo, from initially being mistakenly called ‘Woodstein’, a single entity of so little importance to the Post’s upper echelons that their individual identities are irrelevant, to eventually being on the same wavelength to the point of finishing each other’s sentences (Redford and Hoffman learnt each other’s lines so they could do this at any point in the film)."
- Zooey Glass, Blueprint
"With the way “All the President’s Men” is shot and edited, there seems to be little exaggeration or hyperbole or sensationalism; it’s understated to allow for the happenings and the implications to grow more impactful on their own, essentially mimicking a documentary style of filmmaking. While the facts could have made for a James Bond-like thriller, the presentation is instead that of a newsroom procedural, with every event unfolding carefully, systematically, and without the over-the-top Hollywood standards of intensity – or even the loud, screeching violins that might be found in lesser pictures. Like the greatest of filmic mysteries, details are exhibited with precision to afford the audience the opportunity to learn and solve the case right alongside the journalists. And its unhurried divulgements generate a natural anticipation for bigger and bigger conclusions.
“Follow the money.” Amusingly, the politics in the media industry perpetually thwart tunneling to the considerably buried truth. The competition from the New York Times and other news companies is almost as big an opposition as the higher-ups in the Post, who don’t want to risk publishing a “dangerous” story without more than enough facts and sources. But both are piddling compared to the misplaced loyalties of the politicians and employees who are entrenched in the cover-up: ordinary people who want to help but are intimidated, surveilled, and threatened to keep quiet by a network of powerful, influential schemers.
On the acting front, Robert Redford and Hoffman are in top form. Their deliveries and interactions are incredibly natural – almost as if improvised – boasting reverse psychology and tricky interrogations that are inherently steeped in humor, thanks to the accidental information leaked or gleaned from every little conversation. William Goldman’s script is sensational to match, overflowing with wordy dialogues as if an in-depth news report on the investigation – but with the inherent theatrical suspense surrounding the inevitable exposure of a crime committed by the highest of powers (the kind where corruption becomes the scariest). With its potent plot, sensational performances, and riveting screenplay, “All the President’s Men” is one of the greatest of all political thrillers, setting a benchmark against which a wealth of films after it would be measured."
- Mike Massie, Gone With The Twins
Robert Redford & Dustin Hoffman
'Give It Up (Or Turn It Loose)' - James Brown
This dangerous production's casting contains a conspiracy angle itself. Robert Redford had recently starred in Michael Ritchie's political satire 'The Candidate' (1972) and Sydney Pollack's conspiracy thriller 'Three Days Of The Condor' (1975), in addition to appearing in tricky capers 'The Hot Rock' (1972) and 'The Sting' (1973), all of which predict the kind of perplexing criminal angle he was now keen on taking. Dustin Hoffman would star in John Schlesinger's painful thriller 'The Marathon Man' (1976) around the same time as 'All The President's Men'. Pakula opted to bring in a pair of experienced performers who'd collaborate on a number of films directed by crime specialist Sidney Lumet in their careers, Martin Balsam and Jack Warden, co-stars in '12 Angry Men' (1957). Taking his role as producer very seriously, Redford was initially keen to cast Al Pacino to play Carl Bernstein, an actor fresh from making Lumet's crime pictures 'Serpico' (1973) and 'Dog Day Afternoon' (1975), but he realised Hoffman would be a better fit for this particular characterisation and I believe this decision was fully vindicated. Scene-stealer Ned Beatty would appear for Lumet in 'Network' (1976) this very same year and was fresh off the success of making Bud Yorkin's 'The Thief Who Came To Dinner' (1973).
“Richard Nixon is gone now, and I am poorer for it. He was the real thing -- a political monster straight out of Grendel and a very dangerous enemy. He could shake your hand and stab you in the back at the same time. He lied to his friends and betrayed the trust of his family. Not even Gerald Ford, the unhappy ex-president who pardoned Nixon and kept him out of prison, was immune to the evil fallout. Ford, who believes strongly in Heaven and Hell, has told more than one of his celebrity golf partners that "I know I will go to hell, because I pardoned Richard Nixon."
I have had my own bloody relationship with Nixon for many years, but I am not worried about it landing me in hell with him. I have already been there with that b*stard, and I am a better person for it. Nixon had the unique ability to make his enemies seem honorable, and we developed a keen sense of fraternity. Some of my best friends have hated Nixon all their lives. My mother hates Nixon, my son hates Nixon, I hate Nixon, and this hatred has brought us together.
Nixon laughed when I told him this. "Don't worry," he said, "I, too, am a family man, and we feel the same way about you."
- Hunter S. Thompson, Rolling Stone
"I will be phenomenal to the women. I mean, I want to help women."
- President Donald J. Trump, Face The Nation
"Believe me" has the form of an imperative: on the surface it is a command to trust. It directs the audience to attend to what the speaker (me) is saying. In general, people follow cooperative principles of communication so that people just assume folks are telling the truth and that propositions that are spoken are intended to be believed. People still structure their discourse in ways that show where there may be communicative breakdowns (I mean…) and they can add bits to build solidarity (y’know). But an assumption of truth-telling on all sides is the norm. In political discourse, it is important for audiences to understand the belief structures of candidates. But if it feels odd to have a candidate explicitly describe what the audience should believe, you’re right. The Trumpian relationship between him, his audiences, and their belief systems is unusual."
- Tyler Schnoebelen, Medium
Sidney Lumet
'Theme De Yoyo' - Fontella Bass & the Art Ensemble Of Chicago
I have had my own bloody relationship with Nixon for many years, but I am not worried about it landing me in hell with him. I have already been there with that b*stard, and I am a better person for it. Nixon had the unique ability to make his enemies seem honorable, and we developed a keen sense of fraternity. Some of my best friends have hated Nixon all their lives. My mother hates Nixon, my son hates Nixon, I hate Nixon, and this hatred has brought us together.
Nixon laughed when I told him this. "Don't worry," he said, "I, too, am a family man, and we feel the same way about you."
- Hunter S. Thompson, Rolling Stone
"I will be phenomenal to the women. I mean, I want to help women."
- President Donald J. Trump, Face The Nation
"Believe me" has the form of an imperative: on the surface it is a command to trust. It directs the audience to attend to what the speaker (me) is saying. In general, people follow cooperative principles of communication so that people just assume folks are telling the truth and that propositions that are spoken are intended to be believed. People still structure their discourse in ways that show where there may be communicative breakdowns (I mean…) and they can add bits to build solidarity (y’know). But an assumption of truth-telling on all sides is the norm. In political discourse, it is important for audiences to understand the belief structures of candidates. But if it feels odd to have a candidate explicitly describe what the audience should believe, you’re right. The Trumpian relationship between him, his audiences, and their belief systems is unusual."
- Tyler Schnoebelen, Medium
Sidney Lumet
'Theme De Yoyo' - Fontella Bass & the Art Ensemble Of Chicago
I find 'All The President's Men' to be a thoughtful, intelligent and thoroughly absorbing crime procedural about the importance of a free press, independent reporting, journalistic integrity, newsroom solidarity and what journos sometimes refer to as literary "chutzpah". Dustin Hoffman constantly surprises as passionate pursuer Bernstein and Robert Redford delivers maximum suspense with his extraordinarily balanced portrayal of internally conflicted idealist Woodward.
'All The President's Men' is an influential film. A brief but memorable meeting on a park bench is referenced during Donald Sutherland's show-stopping turn in Oliver Stone's epic conspiracy thriller 'JFK' (1991). I think it's influence can also be detected in riveting investigative crime dramas like 'Absence Of Malice' (1981), 'The Mean Season' (1985), 'L.A. Confidential' (1997), 'Moving Targets' (1999), 'Nightcrawler' (2014) and 'Spotlight' (2015).
"I was so programmed to fail. I had shown no signs of talent as a young man. I was an editor at the school literary magazine at Oberlin College, and I would anonymously submit my short stories. When the other editors - two brilliant girls - would read them, they would say, 'We can't possibly publish this sh*t.' And I would agree. After that I took a creative-writing course, where I got horrible grades. Do you know what it's like to want to be a writer and get the worst grades in the class? It's terrible ... I had never seen a screenplay until I was 33. The first time I ever saw what a screenplay even looked like was when I bought a screenwriting guide at an all-night bookstore at midnight in Times Square."
- William Goldman, The Guardian
"Not unlike Roman Polanski’s unofficial "Apartment" Trilogy, Alan J. Pakula’s “Paranoia” Trilogy finds its three films united through a similar sense of mood and theme rather than a serialized story. Starting with 1971’s 'Klute', then 'The Parallax View' in 1974, and concluding in 1976 with 'All The President’s Men', the trio of films weave a palpable atmosphere of unease — often through the prism of political underpinnings — while following a protagonist’s dangerous journey through an realm of suspense and intrigue. Although 'Klute' situates itself firmly within the detective genre, the following films would inhabit specific arenas within the political thriller — escalating in scope each time — that address themes of grand conspiracy while suffocating the viewer in an atmosphere of dread."
- Nick Yarborough, 'On Pakula's "Paranoia" Trilogy'
"There is a certain apt irony to Alan Pakula’s own career. Here was a man responsible for some of the most highly regarded films of the seventies, and yet who himself remained something of a figure in the shadows. Unlike Scorsese, Altman and Ashby, with their much quoted problems with hash, coke and alcohol, Pakula was a behind the scenes auteur, someone who could shape the material to his own ends but didn’t expect to appear in the newspapers because of it. Describing his approach to filmmaking as oblique, he adds “I think it has to do with my own nature.” (The International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers.) “I like trying to do things which work on many levels, because I think it is terribly important to give an audience a lot of things they may not get as well those they will, so that the film finally does take on a texture and is not just simplistic communication.” This might all sound like preciousness were it not for the subject matter in his key works; it could seem like no more than a filmmaker aspiring to literary indirectness, to symbolism, metaphor and simile. But Pakula was grappling with the problem of communication where there weren’t simply power structures lording over people with great visibility; but power structures looming with much invisibility. Here the tools of metaphor can prove extremely useful as Pakula wonders how we live with the architecture we’re at the mercy of. As Robert Hughes says in his book, The Shock of the New, “building is the art we live; it is the social art par excellence, the carapace of political fantasy, the exoskeleton of one’s economic dreams.” However, as Pakula explores, it is also potentially the metaphorical site of our nightmares. It may be made in the image of man’s glory, but it can often feel as though its purpose is to diminish one’s stature."
- Tony McKibbin, 'Alan J. Pakula : The Architecture Of Power'
'Rescue Me' - Fontella Bass
'Moviedrome Introduction - 'The Parallax View' by Alex Cox
In 2010, 'All The President's Men' was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
