Swing Vote: An Election-Themed ‘Comedy’
Yet it’s the girl who nudges and begs her dad, who has no policy opinions, to become a serious, well-informed citizen by the time he votes. The girl needs a real daddy to emerge from Bud, while the nation needs a chief executive to emerge from the political equivalent of a messy trailer.
The girl’s shoulders are too thin to carry this burden. When the presidency is at stake, does it really matter if some guy in New Mexico forgets to show up at his daughter’s special day in school? The film would have been wiser to rummage around inside the heads of its dueling political consultants, one played icily by Stanley Tucci on the GOP side and the other by Nathan Lane, as a perpetual backer of losing donkeys obviously modeled on Robert “the Curse of Shrummy” Shrum. Both will do anything to win, and that’s as far as the movie goes with them.
The movie isn’t nearly as bad as the inane Robin Williams yukker Man of the Year, in which an ordinary guy threatened to become president, but Swing Vote would have benefited greatly from being cut by 20 minutes. That would have meant reducing the many scenes in which Bud acts like a jerk and his daughter (something of a pill herself) berates him for it.
A merciless trim would also have forced the movie to be less fascinated with cameras and microphones. It can’t stop telling us the media are really interested in Bud. TV crews camp outside his door, commentators analyze him, lights shine in his face, reporters beg for interviews. But so what? A usually reliable indicator of a bad movie is this: It contains, as Swing Vote does, the credit “Larry King as himself.” Movies that show their characters on Fox News and the covers of magazines aren’t quite sure they’re interesting on their own. They plead: Look! Our story made the cover of a fake issue of InTouch, so it must be good!
Swing Vote
Directed by Joshua Michael Stern
Starring: Kevin Costner, Kelsey Grammer, Dennis Hopper, Nathan Lane
1.5 stars/ 4
120 minutes/Rated PG-13
A lot of time has passed since the original of this film hit the silver screens, but this is a copy of a little known John Barrymore film, “The Great Man Votes.”
The plot, much of the dialogue and the theme apparently were taken from the original shich was far superior for its acting, timeliness (the depression era) and originality.
I like John’s review at Powerline much better:
I saw Swing Vote with my wife and our 11-year-old daughter. We all enjoyed it. There is enough rough language to make the movie inappropriate for most children, but conservatives shouldn’t avoid it. If you’re hypersensitive, you may note that Molly seems to be a liberal and the idea that the federal government should do something to “help people” underlies much of the film’s dialogue. On the other hand, it’s obvious that the Republican Kelsey Grammer would clobber the Democrat Dennis Hopper in any election. On balance, it’s a fair movie that skewers both parties and lampoons the pandering that goes on in every campaign. The message of civic responsibility is legitimately a neutral one, and nothing for conservatives to avoid.
It seems Kyle can’t review any movie without injecting politics. I wonder what he’d do to Scooby-Doo or The Apple Dumpling Gang …
it’s only a movie, not the template for life! Just a movie, a dumb movie aimed the great unwashed, who are no worse than the anti-intellectual robots who infest blogs like this.
It seems Kyle can’t review any movie without injecting politics.
It must be true. He took a movie called Swing Vote which was based on an election and he INJECTED POLITICS.
Shame, shame Mr. Smith. Snort.
Really, Kyle, do you just have movie critic bias or something? Does it have to be an art film to be enjoyable for you?
I find that I read your columns less to get a recommendation, but to see if there are films you actually like.
I’m glad to have come across this review and the post about ‘The Great Man Votes,’ which I had forgotten about. The review at National Review puzzled me, and I’m glad someone has confirmed my suspicions about the movie before I wasted money on it. As to Kyle’s inability to see films he actually likes, I think that that’s more Hollywood’s problem than Kyle’s.
Any movie that debuts in August is going to be a dog. I wish Costner would make TinCup II instead.