What is your favorite political movie of all time?

V for Vendetta because it's more of a timeless-type-themed story of destruction and building anew. Syriana because it's that slice of life that shows just how screwed we are, currently...

deegee99
I am torn between Silkwood, Chinatown and To Kill A Mockingbird - al nominated for Oscars!

The Last Hurrah with Spencer Tracy is the best political movie I have ever seen

BOB ROBERTS by Tim Robbins and the film version of Lillian Helman's WATCH ON THE RHINE

Oh, and Rambo 3, the one where he helps out Osama. LOL

Hands down: High Plains Drifter

If the town folk are scared enough, all you have to do is promise to keep them alive. Then they'll let you rape the women and take anything you want.

On a deadly serious note -- for demonstrating the arbitrary, brutal and sadistic decadence of power? Pasolini's Salo. So enraged a local Republican representative of our state's legislature that when it was shown at the State U's film society on the original release he led a citizen's arrest on the society director. You _know_ that hit a nerve.

Maybe you have to old enough to remember when there was just one phone company to enjoy it, but my political cult fave is: The President's Analyst.

Many old westerns revolve relevantly around the struggle to preserve the commons from voracious private enterprise.

One in particular: "Man Without a Star" starring Kirk Douglas, impressed me greatly in this regard when I saw it the other week. Douglas is a wandering Texas cow-poke who runs to Wyoming to escape the divisioning of the land by barbed wire, which he despises with a libertarian fervor. He ends up working for a voracious lady rancher from the "East" who declares her intent to overload the common range with cattle; reap a short-term windfall; and then abandon the wasted region with her profits. After exposing his employer as a personal and economic prostitute, Kirk joins the smaller ranchers that were being victimized by the woman in stringing wire to protect the grasslands from her destructive capitalistic designs.

I viewed this movie as an allegory for the voluntary compromise of economic/extractive liberties in the interests of a sustainable, equitable use of the commons that is essential for a healthy, just society. In short, its a salute to regulation.

Ken Duerksen
Oxford, Ohio

It is old but if you watch it today it is still just as relevant and when it was produced in 1939.
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.

One of the most deeply disturbing movies i have ever seen (on many different levels) was the Tim Robbins movie "Jacob's Ladder". Not only is it an anti war movie, which brutally hammers its point home, but also take note of the shocking statement at the end of the movie that makes you realize what our government has been capable of not only in the past, but perhaps now as well. (i wont ruin it for you, you should watch it) it reminds one of a nightmare where you want to run away from the monster, but cant because your legs wont work, and you sit upright in your bed when you wake, in a cold sweat choking off a scream that started in your sleep. a gruesome horror movie, and even more chilling when you realize the truth of it.

oh and blood diamond, tears of the sun, lord of war, and across the universe (it could be argued that that one is more about the value of peace) are good political movies as well. oh and lets not forget the last emperor and the killing fields. oh and farenheight 9/11, duh!

"It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority." -Ben Franklin

There are so many, and most of the ones already mentioned I second, but my choice is "Animal Farm".
And if I had a second choice, "Alice's Restaurant" (and maybe "They Live" or "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest").

mtwpfs
An old favorite from the Watergate era - Chinatown

Despite the expected Monty Python touches, this dark comedy from the 80s is almost a documentary of today's national security state. Pure genius and my all-time favorite movie.

Another good food-for-thought movie is The Long Kiss Goodnight from 1996. Watching this post-911 is bloody eerie.

Note how many of the 'great' political movies were made by Robert Redford! He's had his finger on the pulse of American political corruption for many years, but The Candidate is certainly prescient - a true 'where's the beef' movie and illustrative of the way media campaigning has screwed up American politics - Best line ever - at the end after they've won, Redford says to his campaign manager - 'What do we do now?'

I'd have to say, since no one else has "1984", then "Farenheit 451" rank at or near the top.

'All the President's Men' did a great job of showing how scary and tense the situation was. My other favorite is 'Three Days of the Condor'.

"All The President's Men"...but I'd also have to add it's comic re-do "Dick".
I can't help...I love "Dick"...

One of the all time great movies of any kind!

The great political movies are:
Dr. Strangelove and 3 Days of the Condor.
Casablanca and Grapes of Wrath fit for 40's classics.
But the GREAT political movie is 'King of Hearts' as politics by other means IS insanity.
One of the best unintentionally anti-war films I have ever seen is John Wayne's Green Berets.

Ken

I just have to mention one of my all time favorite movies: The Gods Must Be Crazy. It's a great movie on so many levels.

the best political movie of all time was "THE OX BOW INCIDENT" really shows american justice for what it is. they cleaned it up for the audience by hanging not only a Hispanic and an old guy with dementia but a white guy too! most unusual that a white guy was guilty of something.

Someone please point out where I might be wrong. It was poorly produced, poorly acted, and devoid of any political sentiment but the idea that commies are evil, and that Americans once worked together to defeat them. Not a single arms-industry lobbyist was depicted in the entire film! It was about as deep and relevant as a Disney story about an underdog field-hockey team.

The sole attempt at progressive redemption in this stupid piece was that we should have built a school in Afghanistan, and then the whole Cold War would have been worth it. Going in I fully expected at least a referrence to Osama bin Laden among the championed Mujahedin, but was completely disappointed.

Ken Duerksen
Oxford, Ohio

"V for Vendetta": A rousing allegory championing the political power of popular imagination.

I also applaud the several depression-era films nominated above - vision was very clear for some back then.

How about "Grapes of Wrath"? - political where the rubber hits the road.

...and as a good exemplary pro-fascist counterpart "Gabriel over the White House" is an invaluable artifact of how fragile our democracy can be.

Ken Duerksen
Oxford, Ohio

Without ANY doubt, my favorite, and the BEST ever political movie, is Dr. Strangelove. After this there are many others, and of these I would pick Seven Days In May.

This movie clearly shows the society wide differences between the liberal and conservative world view: Bedford Falls vs Pottersville.

How about "The Manchurian Candidate" and "Dr. Strangelove". How soon we forget those masterpieces from the 60s...

THE CHINA SYNDROME. While not political per se, did have -- and still has -- political implications. I'll never forget the impact this movie had on me and the audience I saw it with in 1979. Most of the crowd stayed through the entirety of the end credits and remained in their seats when the lights came up. Some of us stood and stared at each other as if to say, "This is an outrage! What do we do?"

I still believe that nuclear power is one of the worst ideas of the 20th century -- not only in terms of the nuclear waste question, but how anyone can justify using a power source that has such dire and horrific consequences for failure caused by malfunction, human error or terrorist attack. I keep hoping someone will remake this movie, retooled for contemporary audiences and the current world political situation.

Other than that, I'd have to vote for NETWORK and V FOR VENDETTA.

"The Power of Nightmares" Adam Curtis (2005)

Frank Capra's "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington." Yes, it's "Capra-Corn." Yes, it's dated. Yes, it may not "speak" to today's political issues, but it does represent a glimpse into how the Senate works, and, with the great character actor, Edward Arnold, as the "fat-cat" villian, you realize there has always been "special interests" involved in American politics.
I like it too, for Jimmy Stewart's superb acting and his stirring, impassioned reverence for the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Founding Fathers and what the word "freedom" really means. Watch "Mr. Smith" again some time and be moved by Mr. Smith's passion for his country.
P.S.- though your kids don't like B&W movies, encourage them to see this with you sometime. It's fun, lively and VERY entertaining!

Executive Action and Parallax View

No contest.

Very powerful movie made in the 50s about power and greed as current today as then.Check it out, you won't be disappointed.Andy Griffith in a dramatic role with Patricial Neal .

2 BIG REASONS:

First - it showed the corruption, the fear and the smear tactics within the Nixon administration. American citizens were afraid to speak. Donald Segretti actually admitted: if they couldn't find something with which to smear an opponent, they'd make it up. First generation Swift Boaters admitting that they lie, right up there on the screen for all to see.

Second - it reminds me of a golden time in this country when the press didn't have political or economic agendas, they simply went after the truth to protect our country.

It's hard to pick just one! Both "Missing" and "Z" from Costa-Gavras deserve consideration, as does "The Cradle Will Rock". Heck, even "Casablanca" could be called a political movie, with its nasty Nazis, Vichy collaborators, and brave Resistance organizers.

But the one I'd pick today, in part because of its painfully continuing relevance, is "Three Days Of The Condor". As Robert Redford says to his CIA boss Cliff Robertson, "This whole damn thing was about oil!". This leads to the following chilling exchange:

Robertson: It's simple economics. Today it's oil, right? In ten or fifteen years, food. Plutonium. Maybe even sooner. Now, what do you think the people are gonna want us to do then?

Redford: Ask them?

Robertson: Not now - then! Ask 'em when they're running out. Ask 'em when there's no heat in their homes and they're cold. Ask 'em when their engines stop. Ask 'em when people who have never known hunger start going hungry. You wanna know something? They won't want us to ask 'em. They'll just want us to get it for 'em!

Can't you just picture Cheney giving a speech like this somewhere deep within his bunker today?

BULLWORTH BULLWORTH

No contest whatsoever. The best politically themed movie of all time is John Sayles' "Matewan".