IMDb > All the King's Men (1949)
All the King's Men
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All the King's Men (1949) More at IMDbPro »

Videos (see all 3 NEW)
All the King's Men (1949) -- Based on Robert Penn Warren's 1946 Pulitzer Prize winning novel, All the King's Men tells the story of an idealist's rise to power in the world of Louisiana politics, and the corruption that leads to his ultimate downfall.
All the King's Men (1949) -- The rise and fall of a corrupt politician, who makes his friends richer and retains power by dint of a populist appeal.
All the King's Men (1949) -- Trailerfan.com - Trailer (Flash)

Overview

User Rating:
7.7/10   4,237 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
Down 2% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.
Director:
Robert Rossen
Writers:
Robert Rossen (writer)
Robert Penn Warren (novel)
Contact:
View company contact information for All the King's Men on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
7 August 1950 (Sweden) more
Genre:
Drama more
Tagline:
He Might Have Been A Pretty Good Guy . . . If Too Much Power . . . And Women . . . Hadn't Gone To his Head ! more
Plot:
The rise and fall of a corrupt politician, who makes his friends richer and retains power by dint of a populist appeal. full summary | add synopsis
Awards:
Won 3 Oscars. Another 11 wins & 7 nominations more
NewsDesk:
(7 articles)
Top Ten Movies About U.S. Politics
 (From CinemaSpy. 3 November 2009, 9:45 PM, PST)

Geek Deal: Columbia Best Picture Collection for $60
 (From Slash Film. 17 September 2009, 11:30 PM, PDT)

User Comments:
Don't compare it to CITIZEN KANE more (48 total)

Cast

  (Complete credited cast)
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Additional Details

Runtime:
109 min
Country:
USA
Language:
English
Aspect Ratio:
1.37 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Mono (Western Electric Recording)
Filming Locations:
California, USA more

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
Producer-Director Robert Rossen offered the role of Willie Stark to John Wayne. Rossen sent a copy of the script to Wayne's agent, Charles K. Feldman, who forwarded it to Wayne. After reading the script, Wayne sent it back with an angry letter attached. In it, he told Feldman that before he sent the script to any of his other clients, he should ask them if they wanted to star in a film that "smears the machinery of government for no purpose of humor or enlightenment," that "degrades all relationships," and that is populated by "drunken mothers; conniving fathers; double-crossing sweethearts; bad, bad, rich people; and bad, bad poor people if they want to get ahead." He accused Rossen of wanting to make a movie that threw acid on "the American way of life." If Feldman had such clients, Wayne wrote that the agent should "rush this script... to them." Wayne, however, said to the agent that "You can take this script and shove it up Robert Rossen's derri?re..." Wayne later remarked that "To make Huey Long a wonderful, rough pirate was great," he said; "but, according to this picture, everybody was s - t except for this weakling intern doctor who was trying to find a place in the world." Broderick Crawford, who had played a supporting role in Wayne's Seven Sinners (1940), eventually received the part of Stark. In a bit of irony, Crawford was Oscar-nominated for the part of Stark and found himself competing against Wayne, who was nominated the same year for Sands of Iwo Jima (1949). Crawford won the Best Actor Oscar, giving Rossen the last laugh. more
Goofs:
Continuity: In the locker room scene, the towel draped over Tom's shoulders keeps changing positions. more
Quotes:
Willie Stark: I'm going to run. You can't stop me. I'm going to run even if I don't get a single vote! more

FAQ

This FAQ is empty. Add the first question.
55 out of 66 people found the following comment useful.
Don't compare it to CITIZEN KANE, 18 August 2000
Author: (patrick.hunter@csun.edu) from Northridge, Ca

While I admit that CITIZEN KANE portrays the corruption of power better than any motion picture ever made, let's also be fair, because any Hollywood movie will suffer when compared with it. A more appropriate comparison would be the recent docudrama of Huey Long, KINGFISH. While John Goodman is excellent as Long and the movie worthwhile, it reveals just how good a film ALL THE KING'S MEN is.

Of course, Robert Rossen's picture has a drab look. It should. It suggests the drab appearance of most U.S. states (anyone who has visited Kansas will know why Dorothy and L. Frank Baum wanted to go over the rainbow) and the use of common townsfolk rather than Hollywood extras adds to this look, as do the drab locations (check out something like the Marlon Brando movie THE CHASE, a movie that should have a drab look, but instead looks like a glossy Hollywood backlot). Thank God Columbia, a studio that loved locations because it had no back lot, financed this movie!

I wouldn't call this film realistic, but I've read the pulitzer prize winning novel, and I wouldn't call it realistic either. Every page brims with beautifully poetic language which the movie often incorporates and which Rossen makes sound more like natural conversation than it really is. Compared to the book, the film, I think, reveals its real weaknesses: it does simplify moral issues and also reduces some of the characters to the level of melodrama (Willie Stark, in the novel, resembles more someone like Andy Griffith's character in A FACE IN THE CROWD: a charming good ole boy you want to love, but who will knife you in the back the next minute). Broderick Crawford, with his Bronx accent, hardly suggests either a hayseed or, as he calls himself "a hick," but he has a bullying power that I think is brilliant for the role. Personally, I'm glad neither Spencer Tracy nor John Wayne (both of whom Rossen wanted) got the part.

And I think this movie holds up very well, even in our post-Watergate era of cynical politics: like the novel, it shows how the populist leader can easily be a tyrant. This message is not in CITIZEN KANE: the lofty Kane was never one of the people; he just wanted to be one of the people. Considering how much Hollywood in the era of Harry Truman embraced the populist sentiment with the films of John Ford and Frank Capra, considering that dictators like a Hitler and a Stalin like to present themselves as one of the people and enjoyed popular support, considering how much Americans love politicians who are charming rather than substantial, I'd say Rossen's film hasn't dated at all.

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