All the King’s Men (1949)
Decided to start watching all of the Oscar best picture winners, in order. I hadn’t heard of some of these movies, some I love and have seen multiple times already and I actively hate others, planning to never watch them again. Fair warning, there will be spoilers in these and other reviews to help explain my point of view.
The rise of Willie Stark, portrayed by Broderick Crawford, from a rural county seat to the governor’s mansion is depicted in the film. He goes into politics, railing against the corruptly run county government, but loses his race for county treasurer in the face of obstacles placed by the local machine. Stark teaches himself law and continues to fight the establishment, championing the local people and gaining popularity. He eventually becomes a candidate for Governor, narrowly losing his first race, then winning on his second attempt. Along the way he becomes as corrupt as the politicians he once fought against. As he rises, Stark cheats on his wife with many women, taking his PR man/journalist Jack Burden’s own girlfriend, Anne, as his mistress.
Stark’s son Tommy drinks to deal with his feelings about his father, crashes his car, injuring himself and killing his female passenger. When Stark bullies Tommy into playing a football game, Tommy becomes paralyzed after a brutal hit.
The story is told through the eyes of Jack, who admired Stark for his honesty and wanted him to succeed due to his lack of corruption, but slowly comes to realize that Sark is just as bad, if not worse, than those he initially fought against and brought down. Jack doesn’t abandon Stark though, not even when Stark steals his girlfriend and exhibits outright cruelty at every turn. Stark seemingly cannot lose, as he has people willing to help him do his dirty work, perhaps out of fear that he won’t turn on them, as opposed to thinking he may actually be doing the right thing. Eventually, Stark is assassinated as retribution for all the wrong he has done, with the movie ending with him dying on the courthouse steps.
Considering the times we live in now, this level of corruption isn’t as shocking as it may have been to those seeing the movie in 1949. It is sad though to see someone who had the best of intentions, but after losing many elections to corrupt foes, concluded that the only path to success was for him to become just as bad as them, no matter who it hurt, and truly only benefitting himself. While I appreciate this film and have no quarrel with it winning Best Picture, I can’t say I like it because there is no one to root for. Jack, the audience stand-in, isn’t the hero of the story because he stands by Stark through everything, no matter how horrifically he behaves. The only characters I honestly felt any empathy for were Stark’s wife and son. HIs wife did what she had to do, considering the time in which she lived; standing by her husband, even as he repeatedly cheated on her and literally pushed her to the side, to live in another home away from the Governor’s mansion. Stark’s son almost drank himself to death to avoid dealing with the day-to-day reality of being Stark’s son, becoming paralyzed during a football game Stark forced him to play, forcing him to live his life out cared for by his mother. Hopefully, they inherited some money and had a better life after Stark’s death; that is honestly the best I can hope for. I don’t really care what became of anyone else. 2.5 out of 5 stars because this is a well-made movie, but I can’t go any higher due to the lack of sympathetic characters or a redeeming character arc for anyone.
