The War Room

Director: Chris Hegedus and D.A. Pennebaker
Year Released: 1993
Rating: 3.0

Behind-the-scenes glance at the inner-workings of (then governor) William Jefferson Clinton's campaign team, led by two fantastic (and contrasting) personalities: (fiery) James Carville and (calculated) George Stephanopoulos. Clinton, ironically, is barely in this - it's about the back room politics, the speech writing, the careful maneuvering around controversial issues (Clinton's visit to Moscow, Clinton's nailing Gennifer Flowers), all carefully dealt with and worked around by Team Bill, although it's no mystery now, twenty years later, that Bill is no slacker when it comes to debating and dodging bullets (oh, those Kennedy Morals). There's some filler in this and I would have liked a bit more clear-cut scenes about the planning and strategizing - Pennebaker's camera is perpetually adrift - but this is a must for political junkies and Clintonites (not to mention those that want to see Carville's then-girlfriend/now-wife Mary Matalin working on the 'opposite side'). Republicans: obviously ... avoid.