
All the President's Men
BFI Publishing
Published on 4. May 2023
Book
Paperback/Softback
112 pages
978-1-83902-404-7 (ISBN)
Description
Alan J. Pakula's political thriller All the President's Men (1976) was met with immediate critical and commercial success upon its release, finishing second at the box office and earning seven Academy Award nominations.
Through a close reading of key scenes, performances and stylistic decisions, Christian Keathley and Robert B. Ray show how the film derives its narrative power through a series of controlled oppositions: silence vs. noise; stationary vs. moving camera; dark vs. well-lit scenes and shallow vs. deep focus, tracing how these elements combine to create an underlying formal design crucial to the film's achievement.
They argue that the film does not fit the auteurist model of New Hollywood film-makers such as Coppola and Scorsese. Instead, All the President's Men more closely resembles a studio-era film, the result of a collaboration between a producer (Robert Redford), multiple scriptwriters, a skilful director, important stars (Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman), a distinctive cameraman (Gordon Willis), an imaginative art director (George Jenkins) and ingenious sound designers, who together created an enduringly great film.
Through a close reading of key scenes, performances and stylistic decisions, Christian Keathley and Robert B. Ray show how the film derives its narrative power through a series of controlled oppositions: silence vs. noise; stationary vs. moving camera; dark vs. well-lit scenes and shallow vs. deep focus, tracing how these elements combine to create an underlying formal design crucial to the film's achievement.
They argue that the film does not fit the auteurist model of New Hollywood film-makers such as Coppola and Scorsese. Instead, All the President's Men more closely resembles a studio-era film, the result of a collaboration between a producer (Robert Redford), multiple scriptwriters, a skilful director, important stars (Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman), a distinctive cameraman (Gordon Willis), an imaginative art director (George Jenkins) and ingenious sound designers, who together created an enduringly great film.
Reviews / Votes
An exemplary analysis of the workings of Pakula's film, a truly insightful study of the way it has been put together and of the sense that its formal details make ... I can't recommend it highly enough. * Film Alert 101 * This stealthy dissection of Alan J. Pakula's seminal political thriller promises to "imitate" reporters Bernstein and Woodward by "asking questions and taking notes and making connections". Job Done. Strong on context, the book really takes flight with its often shot-by-shot analysis, which places everything from bicycle wheels to banjos under the microscope. -- James Mottram * Total Film *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
60 colour illus
Dimensions
Height: 184 mm
Width: 133 mm
Thickness: 10 mm
Weight
182 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-83902-404-7 (9781839024047)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Robert B. Ray | Christian Keathley
All the President's Men
E-Book
05/2023
1st Edition
BFI Publishing
€13.99
Available for download

Robert B. Ray | Christian Keathley
All the President's Men
E-Book
05/2023
1st Edition
BFI Publishing
€13.99
Available for download
Persons
Christian Keathley is Professor of Film and Media Culture at Middlebury College, USA. He is author of Cinephilia and History, or The Wind in the Trees (2005) and co-author of The Videographic Essay: Criticism in Sound & Image (2016). His writing has been published in journals such as Screen and MOVIE.
Robert B. Ray is Professor of English at the University of Florida, USA. He is author of A Certain Tendency of the Hollywood Cinema, 1930-1980 (1985), The Avant-Garde Finds Andy Hardy (1995), How a Film Theory Got Lost and Other Mysteries in Cultural Studies (2001), The ABCs of Classic Hollywood (2008), Walden X 40: Essays on Thoreau (2012) and The Structure of Complex Images (2020).
Robert B. Ray is Professor of English at the University of Florida, USA. He is author of A Certain Tendency of the Hollywood Cinema, 1930-1980 (1985), The Avant-Garde Finds Andy Hardy (1995), How a Film Theory Got Lost and Other Mysteries in Cultural Studies (2001), The ABCs of Classic Hollywood (2008), Walden X 40: Essays on Thoreau (2012) and The Structure of Complex Images (2020).
Content
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1.Who's in Control?
2.The Scripts and Their Ellipses
3.Cast Performance Styles
4.Decoupage and Dialectics
Conclusion
Notes
Credits
Introduction
1.Who's in Control?
2.The Scripts and Their Ellipses
3.Cast Performance Styles
4.Decoupage and Dialectics
Conclusion
Notes
Credits