Primary Colors (1998) 3 1/2 stars out of 4. Starring John Travolta, Emma Thompson, Kathy Bates, Billy Bob Thornton and Adrian Lester.
Forget all you've read in the papers and news magazines, or what you've heard on television.
It's time to judge Primary Colors simply by what director Mike Nichols and his outstanding cast have brought to the screen.
What they have accomplished is both a celebration and an indictment of the American political system.
As anyone who hasn't been living under a rock for the past month or so knows, Primary Colors, based on the book by Anonymous (former Newsweek columnist Joe Klein), is the story of a Southern governor's quest for the presidency.
Any resemblance to Bill Clinton is purely coincidental (wink, wink).
A witty and wicked blend of comedy and drama, Primary Colors is not so much the story of a presidential campaign as it is a Faustian morality tale, a battle for one man's soul.
Ironically, the soul in question is not presidential hopeful Jack Stanton, but that of his deputy campaign manager, Henry Burton.
Burton, the idealist grandson of a famed civil rights leader, hesitantly joins the Stanton team because he thinks the candidate offers hope and a new vision.
But as he slowly comes to realize, Stanton leaves his idealism at the door in his drive to win. Henry's battle is whether it is worth forsaking his values for what Stanton and his team consider the greater good - the future of the country - or bolt, thus putting his personal vision ahead of his pragmatism.
As Henry, British actor Adrian Lester continually shows not only his internal conflict, but the slow tide of disillusionment that creeps over him as he gets deeper and deeper into the machinations of the Stanton campaign.
As Stanton, John Travolta does more than a Clinton imitation. He portrays a man who hungers not only for the approval, but the love of the people - all the people.
Stanton, though mouthing platitudes about idealism, believes the ends - no matter how amoral - justify the means, which is getting him elected so he can create a kinder, gentler United States.
Travolta, with his soft, raspy Southern drawl, is a good old boy who leaves the dirty work to his underlings while focusing on his vision of reshaping the nation.
Travolta's Stanton shows a genuine interest in people. But he is not a paragon of virtue. Scandal sticks to him like flies to a garbage truck. He is a womanizer and a liar.
Yet, he is charismatic. You like Stanton even though, like his real-life counterpart, you find it difficult to respect him.
The moral center of the movie is Kathy Bates as Libby, Stanton's campaign trouble-shooter. Her job is to clean up whatever he steps in. At first appearance, Bates' character is almost caricature and cartoonish, yet as the movie progresses from comedy to drama, her Libby displays a dignity and righteousness that rises above petty politics.
Emma Thompson's Susan Stanton is the foundation on which the Stanton campaign rests. Thompson's Susan is a woman who knows she has made a pact with the devil and is resigned to see it through to the finale, because she is certain - like everyone else in her husband's orbit - that his good intentions outweigh his peccadilloes and other human frailties.
Thompson's body language tells all: her humiliation, anger, hurt and steely determination to see her husband succeed.
A sharp, pungent script by Elaine May is satiric, vicious, tragic and, surprisingly, compassionate. Her ear for dialogue is unerring, and she refuses to simply pigeonhole characters as good or bad.
For example, Larry Hagman's former governor who enters the race to pose a late threat to Stanton could have been portrayed as a Ross Perot-type of buffoon. But Hagman, through Nichols' direction and May's script, brings a quiet dignity to his character that most other protagonists lack.
Primary Colors is an engrossing movie, the best so far that deals with American politics. It champions the process while at the same time deflating it.
Despite denials from Nichols, Travolta and others that the movie is about Clinton, current events surrounding the president do add an undeniable undercurrent to the movie.
And for those conspiracy theorists who think the president cut a deal with Travolta or Nichols to soften the film's portrayal of Stanton, you'll have better luck finding the gunman from the grassy knoll. If anything, Primary Colors will make you look harder at the president, and to see what sacrifices and compromises a person must make within himself to attain his goals.
Bob Bloom is the film critic at the Journal and Courier in Lafayette, Ind. He can be reached by e-mail at bloom@journal-courier.com or at cbloom@iquest.net
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