Opening a Curated Cinema series of Movies to Remember When Mainstream Journalists Weren’t Afraid to Hold the Powerful to Account By with the granddaddy of them all: 1976’s All the President’s Men, celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.
It’s wild to know that the early-70s Watergate scandal, a nothingburger next to the literal everyday corruption of the Trump White House, rocked the United States so badly that, in its wake, any hint of political wrongdoing got tagged with -gate. (We may have finally left that behind; it only took half a century.) Wild, too, to see that Bob Woodward has, in recent years, seemingly lost his professional way, holding on to juicy information for his next book rather than reporting it when it might have made a material difference to the nation, and the world.
But the based-on-fact All the President’s Men, produced only only a few years after the events it depicts, remains a reminder of a time when not only Woodward, not only the mainstream media itself but the citizenry at large, too, cared about the crimes of those in power. Thankfully, the film also still plays as an intellectual thriller of the highest order, a gripping investigative procedural that details the work Washington Post reporters Woodward (Robert Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Dustin Hoffman) did to nail down all the nasty details of the Watergate saga. The competency porn, in which two journalists make the most of the freedom to pursue a single story for months and years — something that feels like fantasy today — is deeply gratifying, to the point where this has become a comfort movie for me; I find immense pleasure in watching efficient, capable people doing a darn good job in service of the greater good.
The superb competency porn extends to the incredible cast — which also includes Jane Alexander, who was nominated for an Oscar for her one brief, intense scene — and to director Alan J. Pakula and cinematographer Gordon Willis. It all comes together spectacularly in Redford’s incredible uncut six-minute phone-call scene:
The slow zoom in — so slow you barely realize it’s happening — ramps up the unlikely suspense, rendering the gruntwork of journalism riveting as Woodward uncovers information essential for their investigation. Note, too, how Redford flubs a name toward the end, realizes he’s done it, but keeps going. (It works in context anyway.)
Journalism isn’t like this anymore. Movies aren’t like this anymore. There’s a romanticism here that wouldn’t be there if that wasn’t the case.
US: rent/buy on Prime and Apple TV; stream on HBO Max (through June 1)
UK: rent/buy on Prime and Apple TV
See All the President’s Men at Letterboxd for more viewing options, including in all other global regions.
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