The Candidate (1972)

	Directed by: Michael Ritchie	COUNTRY USA GENRE Drama/Political NORWEGIAN TITLE Utfordreren RUNNING TIME 110 minutes
	Produced by: Walter Coblenz
	Written by: Jeremy Larner

Cast includes:
CHARACTER	ACTOR/ACTRESS	RATING
Bill McKay	Robert Redford	½
Lucas	Peter Boyle	½
John J. McKay	Melvyn Douglas
Crocker Jarmon	Don Porter	½
Klein	Allen Garfield
Nancy	Karen Carlson
Corliss	Michael Lerner

Review

Michael Ritchie's The Candidate is a remarkable film for all the unremarkable reasons – a sober, thorough and delicately satirical investigation of the course of a California senatorial election, where the reigning Republican veteran (Don Porter) is challenged by a young, idealistic and Kennedyesque Democrat (Robert Redford). The film offers knowledgeable insight into the mechanisms and routines of an early 1970s election campaign in the United States, and is perhaps more valuable today than at the time of release, due to the parallels and contrasts that can be observed in politics almost forty years later. Ritchie's investigative directorial style and Jeremy Larner's intelligent script provide the ideal basis for a nuanced and intricate, yet still entertaining film. Along with Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, this is arguably the best performance of Robert Redford's career.