The Candidate

Directed by Michael Ritchie, The Candidate follows Robert Redford’s idealistic Bill McKay as he and an ambitious strategist (Peter Boyle’s Marvin Lucas) launch a senate run opposite an aging Republican incumbent named Crocker Jarmon (Don Porter). Filmmaker Ritchie, armed with Jeremy Larner’s screenplay, kicks The Candidate off with an intriguing (and completely compelling) opening stretch that goes a long way towards establishing a promising, watchable atmosphere, with the compulsively engaging vibe heightened (and then some) by Redford’s almost unreasonably charming turn as the affable central character (and it doesn’t hurt, either, that Ritchie elicits superb work from a supporting cast that includes Melvyn Douglas, Michael Lerner, and Allen Garfield). There’s little doubt, then, that the picture’s overall impact is hindered by a hit-and-miss midsection that’s rarely as captivating as one might’ve hoped, as Ritchie delivers a far-from-streamlined second act that’s focused on the minutia of the protagonists’ campaign to an extent that is, more often than not, rather oppressive – with the movie, generally speaking, at its best in its smaller, character-based moments and encounters (eg a confrontation between Redford and Boyle’s respective figures). By the time the palpably padded-out (and somewhat anticlimactic) final half hour rolls around, The Candidate has cemented its place as a decent drama that does, for the most part, feel as though it might’ve benefited from a running time closer to 90 minutes (rather than two hours).

**1/2 out of ****