All the King's Men

All the King's Men. 1949 Columbia Pictures.
Starring: Broderick Crawford, John Ireland, Joanne Dru, John Derek, Mercedes McCambridge, Sheppard Strudwick
Director: Robert Rossen
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Based on Robert Penn Warren's 1946 novel, the first film version of All the King's Men won three Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Broderick Crawford, and Best Supporting Actress for Mercedes McCambridge.

Crawford is Wille Stark, a small town lawyer from the south who wins over the public by openly bucking the corrupt state government. He is aided by a journalist named Jack Burdon (Ireland), who was impressed by Willie's honesty after reluctantly accepting his newspaper's assignment to follow the lawyer's campaign.

However, once Willie becomes governor, he quickly becomes "one of the boys", so to speak, proving to be just as despiciable as the crooked politicians he lobbied hard to replace in office. He also eagerly engages in affairs while in office with his campaign manager Sadie Burke (McCambridge) and with Anne Stanton (Dru), the sister of an idealistic doctor, Adam Stanton (Strudwick). Willie goes so far as to organizing a near-fascist police department, and he even arranges "accidents" to take out those who oppose him. Despite this abuse of power, Willie still is a popular figure after he lowers the poverty level, improves area schools, and encourages building projects. Eventually, his own family becomes nothing but props for Willie's photo ops, and his son (Derek) loses all respect for him.

Meanwhile, Jack, who quit his newspaper job to work for the governor, can't believe the changes that Willie has gone through, and he himself can't believe he's found himself in the position of digging up damaging information on the people that Willie has targeted.

Highly, highly recommended movie.