We have an award-winning dramatised film on the life of Woodrow Wilson that although critically acclaimed was a financial bomb. Just another tik in a long list of decent movies getting screwed over by Financial thinking.
It's the story of Woodrow Wilson's presidency. Starting from his old years and going into his older. I was a little surprised we didn't get any early years of Wilson.
Maybe see his childhood growing up in Virginia or moving through the educational system.
'You know the typical kind of thing you put in a biography film.'
But then I remember that the run time for this is 2 hours and a half hours and I'm thankful we skipped over all of that.
We skip over just about anything that doesn't have to do with the presidency here.
We have a very conservative Senator Edward H. Jones* who comes with a proposal for Woodrow Wilson to become the next governor of New Jersey.
This is a bit confusing to Woodrow Wilson given that he's the Dean of a college and has no political experience or at least not in the traditional sense of political experience. The man did have some prior arrangements with various political parties and obviously the politics of his own campus, but still he considered himself unqualified with the job. Perhaps that's more romanticised in the film I couldn't tell you one way or the other.
But with a little bit of persuasion from his family he's convinced that it might just be the right move and he starts on the massive campaign to become the new governour.
In this time he'll be questioned on his politics, his professionalism and his stance as to any old question of the day.
Including his connection to the aforementioned Senator who is argued to be the man to get him in the job.
People are afraid that the only reason he's running for the office so that he can maintain a power structure that's been screwing over so many other people.
But Wilson makes it very clear that he plans to kick this man out of the senate or at the very least make sure that he can't run again.
Originally the Senator is and all that bothered by it he sees it as nothing more than boasting of a campaign the words one speaks whilst trying to win over the vote.
But unlike so many other politicians Woodrow Wilson decides to actually stick to his guns and he fights the senator to his re-election and this leads to the US Presidency.
Because as far as the Senators considered along of a bunch of other people. If you want somebody out of your hair in one District, promote them and push them into a new one.
Woodrow Wilson will eventually Run for the presidency. And this is where a fair bit of the first third of the movie starts to dedicate its time.
This big election Hall full of all the different representatives from every other state. I think it's supposed to be the Electoral College or something leads to that college but I'm not entirely sure.
All in all it doesn't matter Woodrow Wilson does inevitably win and he takes his family to the White House where we spend an awful amount of time establishing the family with all the White House Homes at a lot of romanticising around Abraham Lincoln.
Most of the film after this is just the policy-making of Woodrow Wilson mixed in with some internal family drama as his wife dies and he inevitably finds love with another woman who he eventually marries.
There's also the entire issue of first world war which is kind of addressed in this movie but not really. We don't get to see any of the real consequences or sweeping actions of the Woodrow Wilson Administration it's just more of him trying to keep the country out of war and then doing his best to maintain peaceful efforts while in it.
Oh and there's this huge piece of propaganda towards the middle end of the film in where Woodrow Wilson is belittling the German Diplomat to the United States and he's talking in such a way that the film transcends its own time and starts going on about the evils of Nazi Germany.
At first it was just a light reference to modern day problems and how the second world war unfortunately seemed quite similar to the first but then it goes on a little bit more and the next thing you know you have Woodrow Wilson claiming the German Empire to be this evil Kingdom of nationalised people and it becomes just a little too silly. Don't get me wrong Kaiser Germany wasn't exactly a nice place but they were nowhere near as radicalised as the Nazis.
The film ends on a kind of sour note as Woodrow Wilson's campaign comes near to an end and he starts to wither away from bad Health. His big claim to fame was that he was the creator of the League of Nations
Is pretty much all but dead at the end and he's left quite disappointed with the outcome of his presidency. Tons of dead soldiers in done promised dream of Peace route the world and a lacking society that faces a lot of economical problems.
I enjoyed the film. It's incredibly romanticized and only seems to focus on one side of the president as opposed to anything else.
But it's still entertaining enough to watch any acting in it is really good. Alexander Knox makes a surprisingly good Woodrow Wilson and everyone else performs well enough that you can believe the setting.
It's a bit basic for the kind of film that it is and you wonder why it was done in coloured film.
The movie never made back its own budget who was considered something of a financial flop and I think a lot of that could have been rectified they had just gone for a classic black-and-white look. I suppose it benefits us better today watching it some 70 years later but it certainly didn't help anybody at the time. And the film is arguably a little too long. There's a few points towards the end where you think though they could end the film right here but then they have another chunk or another segment.
But overall I think it's okay.
It may have done better if it just focused on one aspect of Woodrow Wilson's career. Either his campaign trials to try and become president, maybe some of the trials and tribulations he faced when trying to pass a certain bill or just focus on the war effort.
It could either be a film about his time during the war as he tries to keep the country above water or it could be about his entire campaign to keep America out of the war.
Make it a giant character drama about people becoming divided by the president's ideals. Some people making them out to be a sympathiser for the Germans others making him out to be a coward. Maybe even put in a crazy tail of somebody saying that he wants a Mexico to regain its former Imperial power and that he was in on the Zimmerman contract the whole time. Get out there and really do something with the idea.
*For some reason Thurston Hall isn't referenced in the Wikipedia article for this film.
His presence does start to dwindle after the first 30 minutes but I think he was important enough that he probably should have been referenced. And it makes it kind of difficult when you just want to look up the name of this guy and you go on to look them up and you can't find the darn thing. Even worse is the politician who is named after. I'm not even sure if the guy ever existed. He might have just been a fabrication for this film I don't think he is but I can't find anything out about the guy. I found several other politicians of similar names.
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