Heavy political dramas are not my thing, though I certainly did enjoy Frost Vs. Nixon. The Ides Of March, however, I was not expecting to enjoy much.
Ryan Gosling stars as Stephen Meyers, a pretty awesome campaign manager who is working to get Mike Morris (George Clooney) into the White House, where he hopes a difference can be made to America for once. But revelations and plots threaten to derail everything, as Meyers begins to see that politicians will always play dirty, and it isn't so hard to stray to the dark side.
I enjoyed The Ides Of March a lot more than I thought it would. It's quite an easy going movie, the plot isn't too hard to follow. However, it only portrays a very short period of time, and the movie itself is just over an hour and a half, so I felt there was certainly quite a bit more that could have been done to involve me more in the plot, as it starts out quite slow and crams a lot into the final minutes.
Gosling does a pretty good job, as he has in most of the stuff I've seen him in lately. Clooney is good too, but is somewhat overshadowed by the appearances of greats like Paul Giamatti and Phillip Seymour Hoffman. There certainly are a few twists and turns as the story progresses, and there are some great tense conversational moments throughout, but it seems like they wanted to portray the movie as a lot more tense and action packed than it is, with dramatic, suspenseful music playing in scenes where not much really happens.
The Ides Of March is certainly not bad, and I certainly enjoyed it more than I expected to. It didn't do much more for me though, perhaps an extra chunk of run time could've helped spread out the pacing and deliver some more great stuff to round out the whole thing.
My rating: 3/5
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