No reason to beware The Ides of March

The Ides of March (DVD/Blu-Ray) - Dir. George Clooney. Starring Ryan Gosling, George Clooney, Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Smooth and smart political drama about moral sacrifice and selling out.

A naive junior campaign manager (Ryan Gosling) for Democratic presidential candidate Mike Morris (George Clooney) is finally working for a politician he can believe in. But a web of schemes and scandals around the campaign forces both characters to consider making compromises they vowed never to make.

I'm a sucker for stories about people's principles being put to the test and coming up short, particularly when they're given weight by a bit of political intrigue. The Ides of March is an excellent example. This is a film about more than petty scandals and more than corruption; it's about how those things ooze and slurp together to form a gooey, disgusting product we call "politics."

But it falls short of what it seems to want to be, which is a thesis on the corrupting influence of power - because while it delves deeply into the "how," it talks very little about the "why." The nature of Morris's scandal is sexual, and therefore incidental; it could just as easily have happened differently, or not happened at all. A tragic flaw with a little more meaning would have made the lessons here more universal.

But the corruption that unfolds in the film is easy to accept; what's harder to buy is the premise that people at this level of politics could be so idealistic to start with. Morris is an openly atheist, anti-war, pro-science politician in the lead of a US presidential primary, which immediately sets this story in a fantasy version of America that has never existed in this universe. If Clooney had ridden in on a unicorn carried by four singing leprechauns, it would have done no further damage to his character's believability.

It's a symptom of Clooney's main shortcoming in the writer/director's chair, which is his tendency to rub everything in. He hammers his points too hard. He sets up his chosen ones, surrounds them in golden light, and then corrupts them faster and more thoroughly than Anakin Skywalker - dwelling on every step of the process in case we missed something. A little more respect for his audience would have been appreciated.

In a cast featuring the likes of Philip Seymour Hoffman, Paul Giamatti, and Marisa Tomei in supporting roles, the biggest surprise is probably Ryan Gosling. He shows a versatility that his previous work in romances and comedies kept hidden.

George Clooney spends most of the film in the background - or technically in the spotlight, where he exists as the glossy cutout known to voters and not a flesh-and-blood human being. The contrast during his few moments in private, when we see his true self, is fantastic.

Overall, an excellent movie.

Rated R for unwarranted optimism.
4 out of 5

What's Your Number? (DVD/Blu-Ray) - Dir. Mark Mylod. Starring Anna Faris, Chris Evans, Ari Graynor.

Charmless romantic comedy about a 30-something woman (Anna Faris) who becomes obsessed with the idea that she has slept with too many men and vows to find a husband from among her past 20 partners.

I can't really condemn a romantic comedy for being formulaic, because the formula is part of the package. There aren't a lot of other ways these things can play out. A comedy where the two leads realize they really aren't compatible after all and then die alone would probably have limited marketability.

So when Faris's character enlists the help of her womanizing neighbour (Chris Evans) to track down and reevaluate all the jerks she's ever dated, and we know we're just waiting for her to realize the jerk she really wants was right in front of her all along - I have to give that a pass.

But condemning a romantic comedy for not being funny? That's something I'm happy to do. What's Your Number? far too often presumes that mildly awkward and quirky behavior by Faris and her compatriots is an acceptable stand-in for humor. Most of the film is nothing more than a parade of unmemorable boyfriend characters walking in front of the camera for their one-note gag, then disappearing again forever. At times, the movie seems to project an actual anti-humor field; setups that feel like they're about to become funny instead fizzle into a blank stare and a new scene.

And while romantic comedies may all tell the same basic story, there's no reason they all need to tell it in the same way. Faris plays the same lead character we've seen in every girl comedy of the last decade: the silly, neurotic, beautiful-but-insecure woman who lives as the world's good-natured punching bag until she finds a man to affirm her existence. You might remember her being played recently by Kristen Wiig in Bridesmaids, in which case you'll find a few other things familiar about What's Your Number? The movie opens with the exact same joke as Bridesmaids - Faris's character sneaks out of bed early to do her makeup so her indifferent lover thinks she wakes up looking good naturally - then moves into the same embarrassing pre-wedding toast. Neither of these scenes were very funny when we saw them last year, either.

Bizarrely, What's Your Number? transforms into an almost entirely different and much better movie in its third act. The jokes develop an edge. The story becomes focused. The sappy bits ring a little more true. There is some satisfactory musing about individuality and self-determination.

But all of this comes too late to save the movie. With thirty minutes of filler chopped out and some punchlines in the first hour, What's Your Number? might have turned into something worth watching.

Rated R for shoddy dating tips.
2.5 out of 5