Best Man (1964)

Best Man (1964)
by Franklin J. Schaffner

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VHS Tape Cover Information

Actor: Cliff Robertson, Edie Adams, Henry Fonda, Margaret Leighton, Shelley Berman
Director: Franklin J. Schaffner
Cinematographer: Haskell Wexler
Editor: Robert Swink
Producer: Lawrence Turman
Producer: Stuart Millar
Writer: Gore Vidal
Edition: VHS Tape
Audio: English (Original Language), Analog
Format: Black & White, NTSC
Running Time: 103 minutes
Release Date: 1998-09-01
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Publisher: MGM/UA Home Video
Studio: MGM/UA Home Video

VHS Movie Reviews of Best Man (1964)

Movie Review: Literate and sophisticated political drama
Summary: 4 Stars

"It did Adlai Stevenson great harm not having a wife and trying to be funny all at the same time".So declares a delegate at a party convention and it seems equally apt of its author Gore Vidal whose political hopes were shattered by a mixture of his sexuality and a patrician ironicism (twin and insuperable barriers to political advancement in Amaerica then -and maybe still)
The Best Man sees Vidal adapting his own witty play about personal and political morality ,the plot of which unfolds in a party convention seeking to nominate a candidiate for the Presidency.There are two main candidates .One is the intellectual ,Liberal figure of William Russell ,played by Henry Fonda and clearly based on the aforementioned Adlai Stevenson .His chief rival is the younger ,reactionary and unscrupulous figure of Joe Cantwell (Cliff Robertson) a Nixon /Senator McCarthy composite .Both seek the endorsement of the former President ,the terminally ill Art Hockstader played by Lee Tracy in his first movie in 17 years and his last overall.(A Truman figure mayhap)
Both candidates have damaging information about the other -Cantwell on Russell's previous nervous breakdown and Russell on Cantwell's homosexuality when in the Army. .Should either use this information to damage their rival and what is the personal price to be paid for political advancement ?

The movie is shot in semi-documentary style and features great ,razor shatp monochrome photography by Haxell Wexler and is forcefully directed by Franklin Schaffer .Vidal's script is witty rather than profound and provides a lucid and engaging dramatization of the always fascinating political power struggles behind the scenes .The ending is a little too pat for my taste and may help explain why the movie got lost alongside the similarly themed Advise and Consent ,not to mention the more cynical Dr Strangelove .It still remains a mature piece of cinema that politics devotees would enjoy especially but its appeal goes wider than that.

Fonda and Robertson are fine but Tracy takes the acting honours with a moving performance .There are fine supporting turns from Margaret Leighton as Russell's estrabnged wife and Edie Adams as Cantrell's less than intellectually stimulating trophy wife.Nods also to Ann Sothern ,Kevin McCarthy,and Richard Arlen with only an over the top display from Shelley Berman failing to deliver the acting goods.
This a mature and adult movie that should be better known than it is

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