Five Political Films

Dan Rather is a television journalist who since 2006 has been the managing editor and anchor of Dan Rather Reports, the news magazine show on HDNet. Rather was anchor of the CBS Evening News for 24 years, from 1981 to 2005, and also contributed to CBS' 60 Minutes. From his first days as the Associated Press reporter in Huntsville, Texas, in 1950, Rather has earned a reputation as the "hardest working man in broadcast journalism," and has covered virtually every major world event in the past 50 years. His resume reads like a history book, from his early local reporting in Texas on Hurricane Carla to his unparalleled work covering the assassination of President John F. Kennedy; the civil rights movement; the White House and national politics; wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan, the Persian Gulf, Yugoslavia and Iraq.

FilmInFocus asked Rather to pick his five favorite films about politics and politicians.

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All the King's Men (1949)

The 1949 original, based on the Robert Penn Warren novel, is my all-time favorite. It's loosely based on the life and career of the "Kingfish," Huey Long, but it stands on its own as a cautionary tale about populist demagogues and the corrupting influence of power. It's also, if it need be said, a helluva good movie.
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Advise & Consent

If you want to learn about how Washington works — how it really works — see this movie with a terrific cast headed by Henry Fonda. The back rooms are no longer filled with smoke and the issues have changed but the hardball, behind the scenes politics remain the same.
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The Last Hurrah

Politics are complex and so are politicians. There's a lot of good and bad in both, and this John Ford classic gets to the heart of that paradox. No movie serves up a better view of old-style machine politics.
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The Candidate

The quintessential campaign movie (and one that may well appear on everyone's list). In focusing on the unseemly emphasis on image and money in modern political campaigns it was prescient in the 1970s and is as relevant as ever now. Much more than a message film, it managed to catch the behind-the-scenes feel of a political campaign in a way that plain rings true.
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Good Night and Good Luck

While not a film about politics per se, it reminds us that politics finds expression in places other than Washington, DC. Edward R. Murrow is not only the patron saint of electronic journalism, he is also a shining example of journalistic courage in the face of partisan bullying. This dramatization of his defining fight against Senator Joseph McCarthy is just about perfect, with director George Clooney hitting all the details of period, personalities, and place right on the nose. (Honorable mentions on the nexus of politics and journalism: All the President's Men and Network.)