film: The Ides of March

Blowing dust off the ol' blog again in an attempt to organize my thoughts on the film The Ides of March.

Warning: spoilers ahead.


56. The Ides of March, dir. George Clooney. 2011.

watched November 20th

What the fuck was up with the film's treatment of Molly and what happened to her?

I mean, it's possible I was missing things because I was occasionally acting as translator for my friend and so missed a few bits of dialog, but come on. I suppose I should give credit to the screenplay writers for not overtly casting judgment on her, but the moment it was revealed that she had "slept with" Governor Mike Morris, George Clooney's character, my face was a huge :/ because I'm not sure what I got.

See, I thought that the governor had raped her. I thought he chatted with her for a bit that night in the hotel, and then reached behind her and shut the door and raped her. And even if she didn't protest and even if she did go along with it, it wouldn't rule out rape because rape is very rarely the "guy jumps the well dressed (provocatively dressed?) girl in a darkened alley and rapes her while she cries and cries and tries to fight back" story that seems to pervade society's collective consciousness.

But then Steven, Ryan Gosling's character, tells the governor during the climactic blackmailing scene that the governor "made the one mistake [he] shouldn't've - [he] fucked an intern." (Or something along those lines, anyways.)

I was sitting there going, "wait a minute, did I not comprehend things properly? Did he not rape an intern??"

What kind of conclusions are the viewers supposed to draw about Molly? Are we supposed to assume that because she slept willingly with Steven - no, not only that she slept with him, that because she even took the initiative and flirted with him, whatever happened between the governor and her was consensual?

Also, wtf was up with the immediate questioning of Molly's sobriety?

I get that this film is about the ~corruption of politics~ and how it's so ~tough~ being a ~good person~ in politics. But really, we already know this shit. So George Clooney's environmental, secularist governor isn't actually perfect. So Ryan Gosling is perfect as Steven, the driven career man who'd do anything to get a seat at the big boys of campaign managing's table.

We already know this shit, seriously. Is it too much to ask for a film that goes beyond the obvious and instead of ~showing us how it is!!1 in the ~hard world of politics~ offers us a new perspective? Is it too much to ask for a movie that will legitimize a point of view that ISN'T the white, privileged man's? Something that doesn't recycled the same old (wrong) ideas about politics and where men, women, men of color and women of color fit into it?

And don't give me shit about how if I "want to see it so badly" I should just "shut up and write it myself". I mean, I get the point, but wow, way to be dismissive.

Ugh. But overall, good acting and the plot was well-paced, no matter how hackneyed I found it. Also, Ryan Gosling's face was excellent.