Unclear and Present Danger - Absolute Power

Episode Date: September 14, 2024

In this week's episode of Unclear and Present Danger, Jamelle and John watched Absolute Power, the 1997 conspiracy thriller directed by Clint Eastwood from a screenplay by William Goldman and based off of a David Baldacci novel of the same name. In addition to Eastwood, Absolute Power stars Gene Hackman, Ed Harris, Laura Linney, Judy Davis, Scott Glenn and Dennis Haysbert. In Absolute Power, Eastwood plays Luther Whitney, a master thief who makes the fateful decision to rob billionaire Walter Sullivan, a close friend and ally of the president of the United States. During the burglary, Whitney sees President Alan Richmond assault Sullivan's wife, Christy, with whom he is having an affair. When she fights back, the president's security detail kills her. Sullivan, who witnesses the altercation, escapes with evidence of the killing. When he becomes prime suspect in an investigation led by local police, Whitney devotes himself to exposing the president's misdeed while evading Sullivan's hired assassin — who believes Whitney is responsible — as well as a secret service agent who wants to silence the only witness. The tagline for Absolute Power was "Corrupts Absolutely."You can find Absolute Power to rent or purchase on Amazon Prime and Apple TV.For the next episode of Unclear and Present Danger, Jamelle and John will watch the 1997 thriller The Devil's Own, directed by Alan J. Pakula and starring Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt. It's available to stream on Netflix or for rent or purchase from Amazon or Apple TV.

The body has been hidden. The murder weapon has disappeared. The killer's identity has been concealed. Two men know the truth. One is a master thief. The other is the most powerful man in the world. Clint Eastwood. Gene Hackman, Ed Harris,

Laura Linney, Judy Davis, and Scott Glenn, Absolute Power. Absolute Power. It's super power. a podcast about the political and military thrillers of the 1990s and what they say about the politics of that decade. I'm Jamel Bowie. I'm a columnist for the New York Times Opinion Section. My name is John Gans. I write the Substack Newsletter on Popular Front, and I am the author of the book When the Clock Broke, Conmen, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the early 1990s, which is now available wherever good books are sold. I was about to say that as well. So buy the book.

Yeah, please. On this episode of the podcast, we watched the 1997 political thriller, Absolute Power, directed by Clint Eastwood, starring Clint Eastwood, screenplayed by William Goldman, and also starring Gene Hackman, Ed Harris, Laura Linney, Judy Davis, Scott Glenn, and Dennis Hayesbert. In Absolute Power, Clint Eastwood plays Luther Whitney, also based off of the novel by the same name, by David Beladachi, the airport, the king of airport thrillers in the 90s. Next, it was him and John Grisham, basically. In absolute power, Clint Eastwood plays Luther Whitney, a master thief who breaks into

the mansion of a noted billionaire. While in the mansion robbing this billionaire, he sees from a hidden compartment, the president of the United States having sex with the billionaire's wife. The sex becomes rough, mainly because of the president, played by Gene Hackman. And when the billionaire's wife tries to defend herself, Hackman calls for the Secret Service to come in and they kill her. His chief of staff, played by Judy Davis, and the agents, played by Scott Glenn and Dennis Hayesbert, then have to clean up and arrange some explanation for why this woman is dead.

Whitney becomes the chief suspect after Ed Harris, who plays a police detective, is put on the case. But Ed Harris' character doesn't really believe that Whitney could be their murderer. It doesn't really fit his typical criminal activity. When Whitney, about the flee of the country, sees Gene Hackman's president on the television pledging to find the murderer of the billionaire's wife and billionaire is an important campaign donor. This convinces Whitney that he has to stay and get this guy, take this guy down because he doesn't want to be, he doesn't want to flee the country because of this gum bag. What proceeds then is kind of several different plots happening at one.

So Whitney trying to maneuver himself in a position to get the truth and reveal it to whoever might be able to do something. The billionaire hires an assassin to try to kill Whitney, who he believes is responsible, and Dennis Hayesbert, one of the secret service agents, takes it upon himself to try to kill Whitney as well to get him out of the way for the president. Unbeknownst to everyone, Whitney does have proof of the president's involvement, a letter opener that he was cut with, that the president was cut with during the altercation. And after some typical political thriller activity, including an assault on Whitney's daughter, played by Laura Linney, Whitney is able to get this dagger to the billionaire who then presents it to the president,

who then kills himself. And the movie ends with the president having committed suicide and Whitney having cleared his name. And that is absolute power. The tagline corrupts absolutely. Yeah, I was going to call it. there you go um the movie did pretty well a 50 million dollar budget grossed a little under a hundred million dollars totally solid performance for a totally solid adult thriller uh some trivia from i mdb clit eastwood's extremely organized methods of directing led to filming being

completed over three weeks ahead of schedule in two to four million dollars under budget that is why they keep letting Clint make movies because he shoots the script, does it quickly, does it cheaply, and the movies usually do pretty well. You could find Absolute Power to watch basically on iTunes or Apple TV and Amazon streaming. You can purchase it or you can watch it on demand. And Absolute Power was released on February 14th, 1997. So let's check out the New York Times for that day. Well, it's the prosperous 90s. Stocks raced past new milestone as Dow breaks 7,000 barrier.

Climb of 1,000 points, fastest ever took just 82 sections. Clinton and friends, strong ties few questions. From the Whitewater investigation to the White House guest list, from financing his campaigns for governor to raising money for 1996 elections, a thread runs to through Bill Clinton's career. Arkansas's friends he relies on for political and financial support. In Washington, as they did in Little Rock, some of these golfing partners, businessmen, and political supporters worked hard to open the right doors for clients or raise money

for Mr. Clinton's campaign. Some tried to capitalize on their relationship with Mr. Clinton, who has said the governor and the president, who has said as governor and then as president, he asked few questions about what his old friends were doing. Mr. Clinton's first term as president was plagued. questions about the personal and political relationships he formed in Arkansas. His second term begins with questions about the role played by Arkansas friends in the 1996 election, some of whom who helped raise millions of dollars to the Democratic campaign from their own pockets or from

clients they wanted to introduce to their friend, the president. Um, so the whitewater investigation, which was not after this, turns up Monica Lewinsky, the Monica Lewinsky scandal is brewing as we, as in, and I think it's in January that he says, he denies that he had, you know, he had no indecent. I did not have sexual relations with that moment, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie. It turned out that wasn't exactly true. But can I say real quick? It's really funny to me that he makes a declaration during, it's like the end

of a press conference over education reform, I think. Yeah. So like the first 45 minutes just like talking about education policy. Yeah. And then Bill Clinton is like, you know, lips quivering is sort of like, now I need to, I need to tell you. Yeah. Very sincerely.

Now I have to go back to work on my state of the union speech. I've worked on it until pretty late last night, but I want to say one thing to the American people. I want you to listen to me. I'm going to say this again. I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky. You got to put the right emphasis on that woman. This is on that woman. Anyway, so the over 1999, that would become a much bigger issue.

Um, it was, you know, the legacy, I mean, at the time growing up in a family of liberal Democrats, uh, basically the attitude was, um, you know, it was, it was a, a Republican witch hunt against Clinton. I think my dad did express, uh, some kind of disgust with Clinton's behavior. Um, I think in retrospect, a lot of people say, Perhaps Clinton should have resigned due to Lewinsky scandal in the way he handled it. And his treatment of this extremely young intern was definitely kind of questionable. Culture has changed. It's interesting though, you know, when you, everyone likes to say this cliche where politics follows culture. Well, in the case of Clinton Lewinsey scandal, I think it's a case where culture followed politics, which is that, you know, people who are. liberals and Democrats were very excited to finally have a president. We're very angry at the Republicans were really doing their best to try to get him, which was true. And, you know,

people who I think otherwise, I mean, I know this who were otherwise quite, you know, outspoken feminists, you know, went to bat for Clinton and even maybe said not so nice things. I sound like Donald Trump. Maybe said not so nice things about. Monica Lewinsky. And yeah, I think that it's interesting, you know, in a post-Me-2 world, looking back on the Lewinsky scandal, it looks quite a bit different. And it's something interesting to actually think about in the movie that we're about to watch.

Yeah, the, well, it's worth saying that, like, Monica Lewinsky, all these years later, has really come out. I mean, she's like, like, a figure of, like, admiration at this point, which is well deserved. Clinton, it's interesting. Clinton spoke at the Democratic National Convention in August, and it's like, of course he would. He's like one of the, you know, living Democratic presidents. He still can campaign and everything. But he's like, he's not a figure of esteem, really, in democratic politics anymore. Jimmy Carter, by contrast, you know, still still living nearly 100. Like, it's a figure of like

a real esteem and admiration despite, despite a failed presidency. Yeah. Right. Clickin was much more politically successful. Right. But I think, I mean, I think in this is just because I'm reading this book, A Fabulous Failure. Yeah, I'm reading it too, actually, now.

It's good. Yeah, it's very good. About the Clinton years and the extent to which the Clinton administration kind of seeded the political economic order with like the, the, the, some of the problems that would really kind of come to fruition in the late 2000s, I think is really, in addition to Clinton's own behavior, personal behavior has really led to just like a downgrading of the administration. And so much of like contemporary Democratic Party politics is like an explicit repudiation of Clinton era assumptions about markets, about the rule of government, about all that stuff. which, you know, likely burdened Hillary Clinton when you ran for president, right? Sort of like in, and to a certain degree, that campaign kind of crystallized within democratic politics the desire to kind of move past Bill Clinton, which, you know, wasn't we, the American politics still wasn't fully past him.

The Obama administration, you know, had plenty. of Clinton veterans in it, including, you know, some of the people responsible for the financial deregulation that produced the Great Recession. Yeah, I mean, my theory of the case of Trump and everything that's happened in politics is just like too slow of a moving on from the intellectual consensus that Clinton basically solidified. And I don't think Obama was quite, I know that you like my book, Mr. present. But I don't think this is his fault as an individual entirely, but I think as an

administration and as a country and as a whole civilization, my thinking was, oh, well, neoliberalism, whatever you want to call it, is discredited now. We're going to make a big shift. It didn't, I mean, this is just the way things work. It did not happen as quickly as I thought it would. But you know what? And if you go back to the history of the New Deal, you know, like there was a lot of groundwork for, if you read, you know, Schlesinger's books, it makes it very clear there was a lot of intellectual groundwork for an activist government from, you know, not just from the left, but many liberals had already started thinking in those terms. By the middle of the 20th century, obviously, you know, the Depression was a big, you know, a big catalyst for that. But it wasn't like the New Deal and the activist government came out of nowhere. There was a lot of thinking. It didn't emerge like from Zeus's head, right?

Right, exactly. It's, there's decades to, I'll keep it short, the fact that Francis Perkins was a labor secretary reflects basically decades of like. prior political work right right exactly perkins being this like very important figure in new york government and the fact that fDR comes out of new york right like there's there's all this experimentation and social policy happening in um urban centers and urban machines in you know in places run by progressives and the new deal is sort of like the nationalization and a lot of the nationalization of things that were already taking place around the country. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

And then they were, many people were, you know, thinking along the lines to staff the administration. You know, like, so anyway, it's not, it's not quite the same situation, but it was my belief at the time that it would be a similar situation. It took much longer for that transformation to come. Anyway, let's see what else we got here. Rowland seeking tax and job cuts. This is Connecticut News.

U.S. backs bill on money to aid family. Hey, this sounds really familiar. So we just, if you're listening to this, we're kind of recording things back to back this week. And so if you're listening to this, our previous, our last Patreon episode on Joe, when we were reading the paper then, there was a line about a family planning bill for poor Americans. but this is for overseas family planning. Oh. 200 for family, no funds for abortion.

200 would be programs overseas, Senate approval likely. In a narrow victory for the Clinton administration, the House today approved a measure to speed up the release of money for family planning programs overseas. At the same time, it approved a separate measure that would reinstate Reagan-era restrictions, preventing such money from being distributed to groups that perform or promote abortions, even if they use private money to do so. While that vote by a much wider margin signaled the relative strength of the anti-abortion sentiment and the 105th Congress, the Senate has usually rejected restrictions on family planning

and is not likely to go along with this measure. If it did, the president would be certain to veto it. Okay. Anything else? No, I think that that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's most of it. Yeah. All right. So absolute power. Yeah. Have you, have you seen this before? I'd never seen this before. This is not one of the films I saw as a kid, I think for obvious reasons. Yeah, I got to say, you know, we went quickly through the plot. The opening incident with the sexual assault, really uncomfortable to watch. It's pretty explicit even prior to its turning into a sexual assault. It's like, It's, it's, it's, I was almost, you know, several times watching this movie.

It reminded me of a way of a movie from the 1970s, more than a movie from the 1990s. I don't know if you got that feeling. I think for it certain, it reminded me a little bit of those 70s kind of noir revivals. Yeah. Like, maybe that just had Gene Hackman in it, but that's certainly kind of the vibe I got in terms of its kind of luridness in terms of the kind of character, to a certain extent that obviously, you know, Clint Eastwood, you know, made his name in that era. But it's a bit faster pace than those.

Yeah, yeah. The pace is much more modern, but I see what you're saying, right? Like there's, there is some of that, some of that, you know, parallax view vibe. Yeah. Yeah. Or even like a movie like night moves or something like that. Yes. Yeah.

Um, you know, like, I think that this movie almost becomes, I, I, I, okay, it's like a really pretty well made movie. Like, you know, you're watching and you're like, this is going down really smoothly. It's, it's like one of the, you know, the production values are high. It's pretty exciting. And then it kind of like, it has a terrible story, like, has a terrible plot. Not a plot. It's just very, becomes extremely. far-fetched and it doesn't go crazy enough that you believe it as a noir right like where you're like oh well this is like a film noir universe where everything is like a little bit demented anyway so so i don't know it was a little bit like oh damn this movie seems like it's like it rocks at the beginning where i was like oh we're in for another great 90s thriller and then it kind of like gets to a point where um it it sort of like unravels in how strangely it ends like well i mean presumably our audiences so the billionaire's wife is who's murdered the her husband upon learning the truth of the plot from clind eastwood murders the president with a letter

opener that's like the not the murder weapon but was almost what she used to defend herself. Wait is the president murdered or does he commit suicide? No he said he committed suicide he allegedly committed suicide

but I read this oh okay maybe I was wrong I thought it was implied that the guy this 80 year old man murdered him no okay forget it all right even that's really like the the president is a total psychopath in the movie and then all of a sudden he's remorseful and commits suicide does that make any sense to you yeah

i don't know i mean he i don't know i don't know but 80 year old stabbing him the death doesn't seem i mean stabbing jean hackman a death doesn't seem plausibly well he's like purposely purposely walking into the oval office right and he he enters in such a way where it's like oh, he's got a weapon on him, but he's getting through it. So he delivered, I just, like, I just don't get it. That, I mean, I think this is just the movie unraveling in a certain sense. Yeah. I mean, I remember thinking, regardless of how it happened, people were taking news that the president

killed himself much more calmly than I think. Yeah, which is an insane thing to happen. But this movie. I mean, I have not, I have not seen this movie either. This is not. I've seen a lot of Clinton movies. This is not one of them. I actually been holding off on it precisely because I knew we'd be covering it on this podcast. I think you're right to note it's sort of noirish feel the way it feels a little bit like a throwback.

Some of that is just Clint Eastwood's presence himself and Gene Hackman's presence, as you point out. I think it's Eastwood's direction. Eastwood's very kind of like classical Hollywood director, not one for stylistic flourishing. it's it's it's it's it's it's funny because this movie doesn't really have a political angle other than maybe politicians are corrupt although it's not we don't really meet any other politicians but the president and he's it's like the movie's perspective seems to be maybe the president's just sort of like uniquely corrupt here but i will say you know this movie comes out

during the Lewinsky scandal. Like we're right we're writing, I'm not sure we're in the depths of the Lewinsky state scandal. It's starting to bubble up. Right. Because yeah, J.8 was when he says that

1998 is when it really explodes. Right. So it's about the bubble up. And I don't know, there's something because it's too early for it to be a direct commentary on on on on clinton and Lewinsky but it does feel a bit like a commentary on Clinton right sort of like how Clinton's viewed maybe by more conservative Americans it's sort of like a sleazy over sexed unscrupulous yeah um because in the movie right like it's it's strongly in point

that jean hackman's character does this kind of thing not not the killing part but the rough sexual dalliance is that this happens quite frequently. This is a regular, a regular part of the president's schedule. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And so in that sense, I mean, the movie, the movie does feel like a commentary on Clinton a bit. But it doesn't really, other than kind of like discussed with that kind of personal behavior, It doesn't really, there's not really any politics in this. Not a whole lot.

I would say it kind of, yeah, it has a certain anti-politics of being like, oh, well, you know, the president is a real son of a bitch. And what's interesting to me is that his billionaire friend and patron, right? That's not expressed as really like a corrupt, there's too much money in politics. He's like fundamentally like the billionaire, and this is very. I think a little bit of Eastwood's politics in there, you know, the billionaire is like an honorable guy, right? Right. And and and and like who's, you know, outrage is that he should be the subject of a scandal. And the politician that's sort of his front is, uh, is sort of like

this, this, this, um, uh, this, this, this, this spineless and, and, and self-indulgent, uh, creature. I do believe that there is a certain sense of kind of, you know, libertarian distrust of government, uh, libertarian friendliness to wealth, let's say. Um, and then there's the figure of Eastwood himself, uh, you know, playing a role that we've seen in place so many times, um, which is just like, does he ever, does he ever portray himself as a character with real flaw, like not, like weaknesses, like flaws, yes, like, oh, he's not, he doesn't have a good relationship with his daughter, you know, but he doesn't ever seem to be like, um, I'm, uh, oh, like, this movie, he's like, oh, he's very attractive, even though he's an aging man, this is a theme in

a lot of Eastwood got lots. He's, he's hot, he's hyper-competent, he's very sophisticated, you know, like he's a thief, but he likes art and stuff like that, and it figures into the movie. It's just like, there's a certain degree where, I mean, it's kind of fun, but I'm just like, yeah, okay, uh, Klan. That's all to say, like, this, this portrayal of Eastwood that he likes to do of himself as this extraordinarily, uh, suave, competent. skilled, badass is definitely in this movie. And you know what? Like, I don't know, there was a

slight libertarian myth there. One could say, you know, an extraordinarily talented and skilled individual up against, you know, a dishonest society surrounding them who applies their skills to get to the bottom of things is not something. Again, you know, there's a lot of things that align very nicely with Eastwood's politics, although they may not, you know, be explicitly political. And he may not, I mean, I think in many of his movies, he's definitely being like, these are, these are my, an explicit political statement, right? You know, or, or, you know, at least an expression of his kind of cultural grievances, but this movie, I think, is more like a representation of his, the background assumptions of his politics, right?

Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, I'll say this for Eastwood. He's a very conservative man, and I'd say he's definitely conservative filmmaker, but he's not a partisan filmmaker, right? He's not like making movies for Republicans. He's making movies that reflect his conservative values. And here, I mean, there's some of that in this. The fact that Hackman may be a Bill Clinton analogism

that does make this a little more partisan seeming. But it's more sort of like the background vibe of Eastwood's conservative attitudes that are in effect in this film. You know, one thing I was thinking about while watching this is how much this notion of public morality was such a big part of, I think, political discourse in the 1990s. Again, prompted by Clinton, right, by the Clinton scandals, by the rumors and established facts of his affairs and such. But it really was a big part of like public discussion, like what, you know, the president. as moral leader, the president as national role model, the president as someone who has to behave with some propriety. And it's noteworthy, right, that Al Gore, when he runs in 2000,

there's a lot of his running against Clinton, Clinton's persona as a guy who cannot control his appetites. And Barack Obama as well represents a president. you know, picturesque family, good husband, good dad, kind of like an attempt to claim the high ground on this kind of political morality. But obviously that's, it's just like not a thing people care about in the same way anymore. Or at least people care about it, but it's like it's, it splits along partisan lines. Yeah. Right. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think that's just an indication of just how, you know, incredibly partisan our political scene has become and how ideological the parties are. And I mean, I would say this is a, this is a, this is a place

where I think I have grown more traditional in my thinking. Like, I do think it actually matters for politicians to at least like perform the motions of public morality. Like it's, It's actually a bad thing when politicians feel no particular need to pretend like it's important to at least appear to be a decent person. It has like a corrosive effect. Yeah, I mean, at least basically Nixon, Clinton were hypocrites, you know, they lied. Right, right. I mean, Trump lies too, but he also kind of knows that no one really believes him, right? and he knows that he's pretty openly the person that he is, which is an appeal to a lot of

people that he's not, that he's honest in a certain way or authentic in a certain way. I think that that's bad, you know. I always thought that the open embrace of criminality and vice that Trump represented, rather than being a refreshing, you know, antidote to the hypocrisy of society and politics is actually quite dangerous. And I would take the hypocrisy over it in a certain way. I understand that people get fed up with hypocrisy. I just don't think hypocrisy is as bad a crime as people say it is. You know, I think who said it was it was the vice that plays tribute to virtue. So, yeah, I think that this movie is still in the world where there's anger at political hypocrisy, right?

So the guy is going out and saying he's going to find the real killer. I mean, that's an extreme version of hypocrisy, but that's, you know, for the illustration purposes of the film. his two-facedness is something that the movie finds particularly nauseating again you know in mr eastwood's world um of cowboys and cops you could you could see that but but i think that that actually uh is to be preferred um than to somebody saying look i am a criminal and what are you going to do about it you know right right that's right yeah it's uh it's the

willingness to simply embrace one's vice and wear it proudly I think may seem kind of superficially appealing but what it does is it I think it sends a signal to the wider not just the wider political system but to the wider culture that like standards of decency don't matter anymore

and I think people behave accordingly there's been there's lots of mystery I mean there's lots of discussion these days about how So many Americans don't seem to know how to behave in public anymore, whether it's sort of like reckless behavior in their cars or just sort of like acting out in public spaces. And my like, I mean, I think it's partly the pandemic, certainly. But I think it's partly just like, you know, for almost a decade we've had this major political figure whose whole message is like it doesn't give a shit how you behave. Yeah, he's pretty awful. But he's also weirdly like, in a way he's still kind of traditionalist. in that way. I mean, he doesn't have great manners, obviously. But he's a little bit also like

gangster gentlemanly, you know, which I think a lot of behavior now, I think a lot of behavior now is just like, people just are not well social. Like, they're just not taught. I got into a, I don't want to turn this into my gripes, but I got into an argument. No, let's do it. I got into a fight with a guy on the airplane because like he was in the seat adjacent to mine. There was a seat in between us. And he just, like, kept on doing shit that was just, like, had no recognition that I was there as a human being. And I snapped at him. And I said, like, you have terrible manners. And he was, like, it didn't turn into a thing.

But he, like, was actually taking it back and, like, kind of had no idea what he was doing. You know what I mean? Like, he didn't even think about it once. It wasn't like, I'm an asshole and I'm not going to be told off. He was like, whoa, I didn't even think about this. And he kind of felt sorry. Like, I just think there's a certain degree where people's, like, I don't know, do people, I mean, now I'm just sounding like a fucking old man, but like, do people not get taught like by their parents anymore? Like, be aware of others. Like, don't, you know, like, be respectful of others and their space and needs. You know, like, it just seems like there's so many people. I'm like, what the hell are you doing? Like, you're coming into this situation and you're just have no awareness of anybody nearby you or around you that like, you know, it's just. It's just remarkable.

I don't know if it's just a failure of parenting or it's got it's got something to do with the fact that, I don't know. My conservative rant about it is like there is something wrong with this attitude. People are like, well, anything that makes you feel bad is bad, right? It's like, no, sometimes you should be ashamed and you should be embarrassed and like you should learn to behave politely towards others. There's a certain kind of like, well, you know, don't, don't let others bring you down. Like, no, I'm sorry. That's nonsense. So not exactly about the movie at all, but I do.

But I think one way I could relate it back is that, you know, I think that this world of the movie where the presidency is even something where it's sort of like a taboo to, to, to, to to denigrate and to have a sleazy person in it or to you know to be involved in criminal activity you know the outrage that Watergate produced the kind of faux outrage that the Clinton stuff produced perhaps like that's over you couldn't make a movie like this everyone would be like the president's just another crook and and the movie's premise that it's shocking that the president could be a murderer and that could be involved in a cover-up although it's like, well, it plays on the

suspicions of people, but it's still kind of a shocking premise. I don't know if that's even possible anymore. Could you imagine any when are they going to, they're never going to make a movie about the presidency again. Do you think they're going to? I mean, they probably will. I mean, this is an interesting question because I can. No, that was Trump. I can imagine.

Yeah, yeah, that that's, which I'm going to see. I'm curious to how the movie is, but I can the issue I think the issue is that like there's no way to make a movie that's like totally sincere about it right sort of like in a movie in which the president gets caught in scandal it's going to be it's going to be winking right of who of course he is of course he's involved in something terrible um the the notion that people of goodwill in good faith get in the politics to try to do things to improve the their their community or the country or what have you is is i think viewed a lot of skepticism these days. And that makes it, I think, difficult to at least

produce fiction about people who are just trying to be decent public servants. It's not for nothing, right? One of the most popular political shows of like the last 10 years, 15 years or so, was House of Cards, which is all about like, you know, politicians as these Machiavellian, unscrupulous. I mean, it's a bad show. It's stupid. Like that, like that, Machia, the degree of Machiavellianism that it portrays is like, is idiotic. It's like, yeah, people are Machiavellian, but they're also like people. You know, it was like this, this absolute knowledge, like satanic, like, oh, I know everything. You know, like, it's just, it's just kind of moronic. And like, uh, in a way, like, I know it's supposed to be like the

anti West Wing, but it's like at, I mean, look, I have a soft spot for the West Wing. I watched it, but I can see its limitations, but there is something kind of naive about it. But there's something equally naive about the representation of politics in something like, say, um, yeah, like in House of Cards, which is just like a conniving conspiracy world without any actual like friction or lack of knowledge or stupidity or, you know, actual good, good intentions running up against bad, tragic problems, you know, it's just, it's just, it's just, was a really simplistic view of it. And I think that it's hard for me to imagine something much more earnest, right?

The counterpart to House of Cards was Veep, which is all these people are bumbling idiots, which is admittedly closer to the truth. It's way closer to the truth. Yeah. But it's still not, I mean, it's still, it's still, it doesn't quite capture the fact that most of the people who go into this stuff do. so because they actually do give a shit. It pays too poorly.

It's too stressful. Like it's people do these things because they do kind of care. And to the extent that they don't accomplish much or that there's a lot of failure, it's as much like structural as it is like a lack of personal will. And there's nothing really that quite captures that aspect of it. um the other thing is that like i don't know i'll say i'll say one thing about the movie and its depiction of the presidency such that it depicts the presidency yeah what's his theory of the presidency that jean hackman's president just doesn't really have very much presence which which

does feel like a bit of a throwback right sort of like the modern year of the presidency is one in which the president is kind of like all present he's sort of like the customer service officer for the federal state, people associate, people blame everything on the president, regardless of whether or not it has the same thing to do with the federal government or the executive branch. And Gene Hackman's president just, I mean, really just seems like he's just like a guy. Like, he shows up on TV once to do the whole press conference about getting the killer. And then otherwise, he's not really being president at all in the film, which I think is

interesting. Yeah, he's not very presidential. I think maybe because Gene Hackman's not that great of a casting for the president. I don't know. But he doesn't seem very presidential because I think you see him originally in a compromised situation or this violence situation. So, yeah, I don't know why he doesn't come. I mean, maybe that's sort of a, um, you know, that's sort of a problem with the film. And I don't know if that's the, like, casting or directing. But Gene Hackman, like, I think the movie would have done a lot to build up the pomp of the presidency and then bring it down.

But you just, you just encounter the, you don't really understand that he's the president, right? You're just like, here's like a purr. Right. And then, you know, it's revealed that he's the president. But, you know, it doesn't do this dramatic, you know, unmasking where he's like, oh, you know, it's all this hypocrisy is built up on the president. And then he turns out to be a fucking, you know, you know what I mean? Like, it just seems a bit half baked or something there in the development of the president as a figure on screen.

And then it doesn't make it very impressive. Although, you know, again, like the movie doesn't suffer that much for me. It's decently entertaining thriller. Like, it's better than a lot of the movies we've seen. I think we both, you know, enjoy the experience of watching it to a certain extent. But yeah, it doesn't, like, I think even with the title absolute power, you want it to be like, well, this is about the pomp of the presidency and what it's actually about. And it's not what you think it is. But it just doesn't establish that, you know, like it's sort of like rushing.

She's too far into the plot too quickly. But that's because it's a weird situation to begin with. Like the plot, it's mixing too many different things. Like, a thief, like, think about it. Just let me just, let's just repeat it. A thief breaks into a home and inadvertently witnesses the president of the United States committing a murder. I mean, it's kind of absurd on the face of it. So the fact that the movie works even as well as it does is kind of remarkable because it's just not a great story.

you know like no it this gets back to one of our original points that just like it's not a very plausible conspiracy that's like a classic noir situation where it's like a thief witnesses a murderer and he's already morally compromised but is this too far and then he's uses his wits against the much more evil people but the fact that inserting the president to it it's like oh that adds another twist but that's sort of childish i don't know yeah yeah no it seems like oh I got another twist. The murderer is the president. Okay.

All right. Give me a break. Yeah, I just... The murderer is Bill Clinton. Another one on the list. Yeah, exactly. The Clinton crime family. It was another one.

What was it? It was called the Clinton kill list, I think. Which is all true. No, no, we don't believe that. Clinton body count. Right. Clinton body count. I don't think that they murdered anybody.

This has way more names than I think I... Yeah, they've killed a lot of people. I recognize. Look, if anybody had people killed, I'm sorry, it was the Kennedys. I'm sorry. I think that's right. If I had to choose...

Who had somebody killed? A rich political family that not just accidentally had people killed. Well, they did that too. As is the case with Chapman Quiddick. But I definitely had people killed. The Kennedys feel like they'd be at the top of the list there. Yeah, they've been killing

a lot of people. Anyway, now we're just just, you know, libeling people. So we should relax with that. Parity. This is a humor podcast and we are doing a parody of political discourse. I don't actually

believe that the Kennedys murdered several people. Apparently, even looking at this, the body count conspiracy. There are people who think that H. Oliver Clinton had John F. Kennedy Jr. killed.

I believe that. Why? Is there a motive? The rationale is that Kennedy was reportedly considered seeking the seat of Daniel Patrick Moynihan in the 2000s. Oh, so she hadn't killed so she could win the seat?

Yeah. If she's such a ruthless genius of murder, why couldn't she win the fucking presidency? Right, right. Yeah. I mean, she could have, you know, why did the assassination suddenly ended when it really counted, you know? Yeah, Trump's still walking around alive. Oh, well. Obama's still alive. Well, perhaps they had something to do with that little recent episode. You never know. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. We should wrap up soon, but I want to say real quick. It is wild that that's basically forgot. And nobody gives a shit. And you know what? I wish I could say I wrote this take. I didn't quite. I pulled back. I was almost going to do it. And this is why you should just sometimes write the take. I said, let's see what happens. I said, everyone's going a little crazy. I thought I was going to make a huge difference too. But I was like, let's just calm down a little bit. I wish I had said, there's very likely this is not going to cause a big difference. But I wasn't, I didn't have that much foresight. But I could see a world in which you'd

the most I said as well is that like there's not a ton of evidence that these things make a big difference but like right knows right but like yeah no I mean it made it made zero difference like everyone was so certain that it was like the election the election has changed he just won the election you know and then no he could still win but not because of that no no it's not going to have any effect whatsoever on whether he wins or loses. Okay. With that with that digression on the Trump assassination attempt up the way, let's wrap up. Final thoughts. I think you should see this movie because it's like a good solid movie. Like I had it on. I had it on last night. My wife and I watched it. We did other stuff too. It's actually a perfect movie. If you have like to

check email or like do other things, you can have it on and you're not really ever going to miss anything. no it's it's it's it's entertaining it's pretty well made it's like you know it's a it's a pretty good hollywood movie it's like what they what they do and uh you know you you sort of wish they they could still do it um we've seen some bad ones and some good ones and this is a you know a solidly middling one that's not a waste of your time yeah i think that's right yeah uh okay so that is our show thank you everyone for listening. If you're not a subscriber, please subscribe.

We're available on iTunes, Spotify, and Google Podcasts, and wherever else podcasts are found. If you do subscribe, please leave a rating and reviews. People can find the show. You can reach out to us over email at unclear and present feedback at fastmail.com. For this week in feedback, we have an email from, we have an email from, from Rachel her email is stable government being good for business this is a regarding a riff made on our shadow conspiracy episode um hello love your podcast and learn a lot about

the gaps of history where you learn details or connect the dots in different periods anyway this email is not related to the shadow conspiracy film but buoy is mentioning the speaker at the dnc saying that the rule of law is good for business. This is on one hand so bog-smackingly obvious, so it's absurd that it has to be said. But on the other hand, I think of folks are so used to the current world order, which is vastly more stable than many periods in the past, I'll be collectively forget how bad it can actually be. I've been slowly working my way through the Middle Kingdom as by Martin Rady, which is a history of Central Europe. There's quite a few extensive chapters about the various

forms of early state building that came about in what is now Germany, Austria, the Balkans, and et cetera and how the processes differ. A major motivator for all of them was how to make trade and business more stable and lucrative. The motivation for the nobility and such was often to make more space for sustainable taxes to fund whatever rewards or any other nonsense they wanted to

get into, but it was in tension with interest more motivated by a desire for stability and less uncertainty so they could have a long-term well. Highly recommended book, I've read other histories of this part of Europe, but usually just focused on one of our modern states. Thanks for the show. Thank you for the email.

Rachel, that does sound like a really interesting book. And yeah, we talked in a recent episode, actually the Joe episode on the Patreon about moderate republicanism and how it was like its own kind of political tradition. Like one of the things that moderate Republicans were like obsessed with with like this notion that like it's very important to maintain like a staple and regular political and economic order for like business investment, that business owners. capitalist they just they want stability they want they want the knowledge that things are not going to change um and that's that's sort of what they care about um and that is um you don't really hear

that much from republicans anymore no we'll talk about that from republicans no i don't think that stability is the rhetoric that appeals to the republican voter uh these days definitely not in a Maybe to swing voters who could still vote Republican, but definitely not to like a Republican primary voter. Yeah, Republican primary voters seem to want to hear that everything is terrible. Like I've been just, you know, following me campaign closely. And it's like, you'll hear Trump be like, yeah, your kids go into schools and they come out with surgeries on them. Yeah, it's just bonkers shit. And, you know, be a Democrats who are aborting children after they're born.

It's like, I think people seem to want to hear insane things about the world. and not not not uh you know stayed stayed moderate republicanism anymore now no who wants it who wants it uh okay episodes come out every two weeks and so we will see you then with an episode on the devil's own a movie i have never heard of oh you've never seen it you've never heard of no i've seen this movie twice actually uh uh directed by Alan J. Pekula, starring Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt. Frankie, Ray Plotz, synopsis, Frankie McGuire, one of the IRA's deadliest assassins,

draws an American family into the crossfire of terrorism. But when he is sent to the U.S. to buy weapons, Frankie is housed with the family of Tom O'Meara, a New York cop who knows nothing about Frankie's real identity. Their surprising friendship and Tom scoring suspicions forces Frankie to choose between the promise of peace or a lifetime of murder. We haven't watched an IRA, movie in a while. Who else is in this? Treat Williams. Matasha McElton, McElhoney, McClellan? I don't know.

I don't know either. She's in a lot of other movies about the IRA, right? Or she's at least one. I think she's in Patriot Games. Yeah, she's also in Ronan, which we'll do. Oh, she's in Ronan. She's not in Patriot Games. As a different actress. All right. So that's our next film. The Devil's Own. Looking forward to that one. You can find the Devil's Own to watch on demand on Amazon and Apple TV, rent or purchase, the usual.

Don't forget our Patreon where we watch the films of the Cold War and try to unpack them. For $5 a month, you get two bonus episodes every month, as well as access to the whole back catalog of films we've done. Our most recent Patreon episode, as I've mentioned, is on Joe, the 1970 movie starring Peter Boyle, Weird Movie. very, very, very 1970s, but I thought we had a good conversation. So sign up for the Patreon, check out that episode. And we're doing a little mini series on a vigilante thriller.

So after Joe, we're going to cover Dirty Harry and then Death Wish and then Hardcore, which is the Paul Schrader movie, which also stars Peter Boyle. All right. That is it for us. For John Gans, I'm Jamel Bowie, and we will see you next time.