It has long been clear to everyone that politics is the dirtiest and most corrupt branch of human activity. A person who is not ready to roll in the mud with pigs and obviously cannot come out of it dirty, muddy and shitty cannot pass there. I don’t know if it has always been like that or if politics has become completely adulterated in the last 50, 60 years, but whoever can do it, who has some dignity and honesty, stays as far away from that scum as possible. Unfortunately, that’s why it’s the way it is for us, because the worst scum, the lowest human scum, crooks, sociopaths, egotrippers, sleazeballs, scumbags and thieves, whom we wouldn’t let guard the sheep under ideal conditions, were left to deal with politics.
Since the beginning of the film, films have been made about politics and politicians, campaigns and elections, so even “The Ides of March” does not represent something we haven’t seen and something we didn’t know, but it is a political drama that makes people sick again. It is well known that elections and campaigns have become something in which nothing is scrutinized and there is no such thing as chivalry or dignity, and perhaps it is even more important than one’s own candidate to present the best light, to denigrate the opponent as best as possible. Equally important to attracting his own voters is dissuading rival voters from going to the polls, and the Democratic candidate for the preliminary party elections, Governor Mike Morris (George Clooney) seems like an idealist and a man of progressive, modern views from which he does not intend to deviate at any cost.
Philip Semour Hoffman is his campaign manager Paul Zara, but the main character of this cynical drama is the young PR man Stephen (Ryan Gosling), who works for Morris out of conviction and is sure that the soft-spoken governor will become a president who will change the world. And while everyone around him is a realist, ready to compromise, even extremely cynical because they are aware of how the world works. Of course, young Stephen is not flowers either. And he is a self-loving egotist who hopes to end up in the White House with Morris if he becomes president, and he is not immune to tricks to take over Zara’s position and become the first to Morris.
All this is taking place before and during the primary elections in Ohio, which could decide which of the Democrats will be chosen as the presidential candidate. Everyone is tense, exhausted, and the ambitious Stephen will show a certain amount of naivety. Not only when he embarks on a secret relationship with 20-year-old intern Molly (Evan Rachel Wood), also the daughter of the party’s general secretary, but also when his ego gets the better of him and he agrees to secretly meet with the rival candidate’s chief of staff Tom Duffy (Paul Giamatti ).
A naive idealist will understand first hand how politics actually works when he finds out that he has taken the right step and that he is actually easily replaceable and that those he believes in will get rid of him without a second thought if it suits them. In addition to playing the governor, Clooney is also a director, and with Grant Heslov, with whom he also worked on the political drama “Good Luck and Good Luck” and Beau Willimon, he also wrote the screenplay. Political topics are obviously extremely intriguing to Clooney, and although it is a well-known fact that this famous actor is much closer to the left-liberal political spectrum and to the Democrats, not to the Republicans, he brilliantly showed that there is not too much difference in morals. The only goal of both of them is to win power and grab power, and they are ready to do absolutely anything to present themselves in the best possible light, and there are no ideals anymore.