Election (1999)
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Election Movie Review
Election is a 1999 teen comedy film directed by Alexander Payne and starring Reese Witherspoon. It’s one of the director’s best films.
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“It’s like my mom says,
“The weak are always trying to sabotage the strong“
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It follows a high school election while also focusing on a self-destructive path of a teacher. The movie acts as a surprisingly sophisticated satire on politics overall. Yes, this is high school, but it’s very similar to the real elections so it becomes truthful, relevant and powerful. In particular, the film portrayed three very different, but all too real, candidates highly accurately.
This is a very weird movie across the board as it combines its satirical elements with some odd plot points and a lot of humor. In my opinion, the humor mostly worked as the film is actually very funny almost throughout its whole runtime as it’s on-point, well acted, sharp and honest.
What I did not like was the first act, at least some of it. The entire ephebophiliac subplot was not only highly uncomfortable to watch, but also pretty unnecessary in the bigger scope of things. The movie definitely has too many characters and subplots so it struggled often with the editing, but the characters are so colorful that I ended up loving it regardless.
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Matthew Broderick is excellent as Jim McAllister in one of his final big roles. He’s very good and quite believable too. The character also serves as the most relatable and realistic type here. Tracy Flick is a one of a kind creation. She’s so obnoxiously competitive and self-centered, but also genuinely amusing in her lines of monologue as well as dialogue.
All of us know at least one Tracy Flick, and the movie really got how these people act and annoy others. Reese Witherspoon definitely is phenomenal, and the fact that she was so great at such an early age shows what a great talent she’s always been.
But Paul is the most likable and best person in this film, and it was necessary to show that these people still exist. As for Tammy, she may have seemed shortchanged later on, but she was a genuinely interesting character in the first half with her lesbian relationship being well explored, and her speech being downright hilarious.
So Election is definitely superbly acted across the board, but it’s also well paced as it’s entertaining from start to finish with never a single dull moment to be had. Only rushed moments are present, but that’s because its book structure with a lot of characters and subplots did hurt it at times.
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But it also made it a rich cinematic experience as it created a whole high school world in and of itself. It thus succeeds as a strong teen movie while being a comedy classic too. I also loved the narration against all odds (I am usually not a fan of it at all) as it is character-revelatory and important for the story. The dialogue is terrific as well.
Reese Witherspoon is terrific in Election, and Matthew Broderick is also pretty good. This movie is rich with colorful personalities, memorable subplots and hilarious dialogue too. The ephebophiliac subplot is not only uncomfortable, but unnecessary for the plot. But otherwise everything worked splendidly here – the humor is great, the characters are unforgettable and it succeeds as a particularly potent satire on elections in politics. Alexander Payne is a hit-or-miss director for me, but this surely belongs among his definite hits.
