Sean Penn, Jude Law, Anthony Hopkins, Kate Winslet, Mark Ruffalo, James Gandolfini

I thought this movie much too dark
too shallow and too slow
Most characters don't come to life
they just go with the flow

It starts off well with Willie Stark
the hick who would be king
He turned the tables on the folk
who'd yanked him on a string

He gave 'em heck, this simple man
but power soon corrupts
He gets his fingers dirty
and a scandal then erupts

He's no more crooked than the rest
as we will soon discover
And asks his spin practitioner
some secrets to uncover

Jack Burden is his right hand man
Polite and politic
Backgrounds more like chalk and cheese
Yet something makes it stick

A tangled web they weave and spin
But much is left unsaid
Desires, dreams and ambitions
left hanging by a thread

Sean Penn fits neatly in the role
Law mostly looks pretty
Winslet never gets a chance
to show her nitty gritty

The others just weave in and out
without a strong foundation
If this one's showing on TV
I think I'd change the station





Amanda Richards

Dismissed by the critics as portentous and vague, this remake of All The Kings Men has the makings of a great film and features another incredible performance by Sean Penn. Even if all the parts don't necessarily make a great whole, the film is still totally watchable.

Sean Penn is Willie Stark, the Southern country boy who wants to be governor, who wears his hair cropped close at the sides and standing up straight on top. Willie begins his career as a lawyer and local official, and, as he sizes people up, he gauging weakness and strengths.

Quietly malevolent, Penn steadily builds his performance so that Stark - although his path is paved with good intentions - turns into a screaming and symbol of the oppressed, repelling evil capitalists and corrupt politicians and promising to build schools, roads, and bridges.

Attacks on him by other politicians are, he says, attacks on the people. In a montage of speeches, we see the populist turn into a demagogue. Watching his rise to power is witnessed through Jack Burden (Jude Law), an outcast from a wealthy family who works as a newspaperman.

Jack joins up with Willie and becomes his confidant and his hatchet man and the center of the movie is the bond between two utterly different men. Jack is represents an offshoot of the old world moneyed elite and Willie is the working class rebel made good.

Director by Steven Zaillian steadily moves the story between the past and the present as he introduces all the supporting players, who in various ways influence Willie's rise to the governorship. There's Jack's ineffably cultivated childhood friends Anne (Kate Winslet) and Adam Stanton (Mark Ruffalo), Anthony Hopkins, as a crotchety old judge whose actions threaten to bring Willie down, and James Gandolfini and Patricia Clarkson, as astute political operatives who stage-manage political Willie's campaign.

There's no doubt that All The King's Men is gorgeously fashioned and it features some great acting from its ensemble cast. Yes - the movie has problems, often coming across as a little too overproduced, with James Horner's music swelling and too overbearing throughout. And the tone of the film is often too self-important for its own good.

Zaillian does a good job, however, of showing how politics and power can corrupt. Stark becomes dishonest and crooked, but personal gain is not his goal. You admire him for wanting to help the people while at the same time you despise him for his underhanded methods and the way he tries to hold onto power at whatever cost.

Penn's performance is one of the best of his career. There is hardly a false step from beginning to end. He really does get to the heart of Stark's character, demonstrating how good people can often be blindsided by power and money, and transformed by trying to hold fast to what they believe to be right and just causes. Mike Leonard December 06.