Swing Vote

Kevin Costner is adorable as the slacker father of a overachieving, 12-year-old daughter. The kid-as-parent/parent-as-kid premise wouldn't have worked nearly as well if Costner's character, Bud Johnson, weren't so darn lovable. If you're looking for perfectly coiffed, cleaned up Costner, you won't find him here. He mostly looks like your husband first thing in the morning -- you know, the scruffy hair, unshaven face, and glazed over, half-asleep look where you wonder what you ever saw in him? But inside is a heart of gold? He pulls this role off to perfection. He's the lovable underachiever always with a clueless grin.

When the attorney general shows up at his door to tell him basically that he has the deciding vote, Bud's only comment, in a half-whisper is, "Does this mean I'm going to have to do jury duty?" The movie is good -- in fact if you like Dave with Kevin Kline, you'll like Swing Vote.

However, it tried to combine two movies. One was the comedy with Bud being the ONLY voting demographic needing to be catered to -- hence, personal appearances by Richard Petty and Willie Nelson -- the other was a sometimes hard-to-watch story of a daughter, played by Madeline Carroll, caring for her alcoholic father.

Carroll is a wonderful actress, and would be stellar in a drama. Her wistful, knowing looks at her father's helplessness, and her astute understanding of her mother's inability to be a mother were heart-wrenching. That could have been an entire story in itself and often took away from the comic elements. Mare Winningham was fantastic as the mother who ran away. She, Costner and Carroll really clicked on screen in their one scene together as a family torn apart by the selfish indulgence of the parents to the detriment of the child who deserves more. I marveled at that scene until I remembered that Winningham and Costner were in the movie "The War" as parents torn apart by Vietnam to the detriment of their son, young Elijah Wood. Costner and Winningham should get together again in a more upbeat film. Their relationship is very natural.

But in spite of the sad, child-having-to-be-the-adult part of Swing Vote, it was 80% comedy, and Costner's antics made it laugh out loud funny at times. It didn't seem to be politically bent one way or the other. It was patriotic and commented on immigrants from Mexico taking away jobs from Americans. But it was also pro-environment and touched on lack of health care for the many. The end was pure feel-good. Everyone changed appropriately, realizing the true (Hollywood) meaning of voting in America.

Yes, the whole concept is absurd, and as a result the film will probably take a lot of criticism, but I really enjoyed every minute of it at an early screening this evening. I enjoy Kevin Costner's work except when he tries to go action hero and he is thankfully getting too old for that unless he decides to buy growth hormone from Stallone or something. He was terrific in Mr. Brooks and he excels once again in a totally different role. It is the sort of character that he does best, more akin to his "Bull Durham" role.

The real find of the film was Madeline Carrol who played his daughter. She joins Abagail Breslin, Dakota Fanning , and Anna Sophia Robb in a current crop of extremely talented tweeners.

I enjoyed the entire cast and it was great to see Judge Reinhold for the first time in awhile.

The whole concept of how Costner's vote becomes so important is one that is hard to swallow, but if you go along for the ride I promise that you will have a great time.

Late in the film Mare Winningham appears in perhaps the films most powerful though least appropriate scene. It is her only scene. I believe it was used to hammer in a serious message though the scene had little to do with the message of the film other than shift to a more sober mood. Sober may not have been the best choice of words to describe the scene though.

One of the nicer aspects of the film is its terrific music. A mix of tunes from several decades centered around Marshall Tucker's "Can't You See" really makes for a nice soundtrack.

Ultimately the film has a great message about the importance of one person, one vote. And if it gets a lot more democrats(whoops I mean Americans) to vote this year, then in my opinion it will have done a great public service in addition to being solidly entertaining. And no, it does not have a liberal agenda, so all you Rush fans need to hold judgment before slamming the film. Unlike this reviewer, the film is really good at not taking a political stance. The film depicts all politicians as if they would stoop to anything to get elected, and garners a lot of laughs with that premise.

I want to add one last thing. I would call this a family movie except for the profanity. I took my 9 year old precocious daughter and she loved it, but there was actually a running joke about Costner's character's love of swearing. So if a little swearing and some references to controversial issues (abortion, gay marriage, legal pot) are OK with you, bring the kids. Like I said, it does have a good message.

I expected little after the lukewarm critical response. The film is not a scathing satire of right-wing hypocrisy. But it is inspired. And rare for this genre, balanced. It's target is voter complacency and the winning-is-everything bloodsport of the presidential race. Believe it or not the film makes a good case for voting as a moral choice, a choice we should take seriously. Not the stuff of Hollywood hilarity for sure. Yet it is well-acted, charming and original. Hard to guess where the story is going. Great laughs are better for being unexpected.

Liberal-leaning viewers and critics may have been disappointed based on a trailer showing Dennis Hopper as a rapid pro-life candidate. The story here is about voters. And how far our major political parties are willing to go to court the swing vote. The genius of this film is that it takes targeted campaigning to its logical conclusion. This is the stuff professional persuaders are more and more paid to do.

Not perfectly executed, but an inspired premise with better than expected follow-though. A treat. So glad I went.

P.S. full disclosure, I am a very liberal Democrat.

I can understand fully why this Kevin Costner movie fell so far under the radar, if the man has any sense he put it there!

It's not that it's a bad film, it's just a mediocre one with one of the most offensively ridiculous concepts of all time.

So we have Bud, a redneck and all round failure at life (Especially to his daughter). His daughter registers him to vote but then due to a fault with the voting booth he becomes the "Swing" voter. Namely this hick has the single handed decision who becomes the President of the United States.

Yep, THAT dumb.

Despite a great cast including Costner, Patton, Tucci, Hopper & Grammer this is a foolish movie.

Yes it is highly accurate in it's presentation of politics but lacks in the comedy and simply isn't as dramatic as it aims to be.

One for hardcore Costner fans only.

The Good:

Bill Maher

Solid cast

The Bad:

Laughable representation of the Republican party

Concept is ridiculous

Too much FOX "News"

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

The writers were high on weed when writing the script and somewhere along the way someone was high on crack for giving it the green light!

My son tells me that I don't understand what young people think is funny. And he's right. I'm not into cringe comedies like Borat or teen sex comedies like Superbad. So when I give Swing Vote 9 out of 10, I guess I have to limit my recommendation to those over 50. If you're too young to remember Kevin Costner's last great movie, I'm not so sure you'll like this one. You see, no one gets humiliated and you don't hear any jokes about sex or bodily functions. It's an old-fashioned comedy that my wife, my cousin and I, all near 60, loved. If you are in that age range, ignore the critics and the IMDb rating. We laughed all the way through. The editing is fast paced so that you never get bored. Some critics have criticized Swing Vote for being lightweight, but it is really more dramedy than straight comedy. There are several serious themes including divorce and civic responsibility. This is Costner's best performance in many years. And Madeline Carroll, who plays his daughter, is amazing. Watch out, Dakota Fanning and Abigail Breslin. This girl can play comedy and drama with equal aplomb. The scene where she cries in front of her class brought many to tears in our audience.