{"id":16387,"date":"2012-06-26T08:00:19","date_gmt":"2012-06-26T13:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs2.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/?p=16387"},"modified":"2012-06-19T16:49:18","modified_gmt":"2012-06-19T21:49:18","slug":"the-contender-on-dvd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/the-contender-on-dvd\/","title":{"rendered":"The Contender on DVD"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Coincidentally, I watched two Gary Oldman movies in quick succession.\u00a0In Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy<\/a><\/strong><\/em>, he plays the subdued but heroic George Smiley. More recently, I watched The Contender<\/a><\/strong><\/em>. The multi-talented Oldman also produced the film.<\/p>\n

Oldman’s character, this time, is the polar opposite of Smiley.\u00a0Congressman Shelley Runyon, is malevolently and unappetizingly evil.\u00a0Even the way he eats bloody steaks (and talks with his mouth full) is disgusting.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>He\u00a0abuses his power as the head of the judiciary committee with a ruthless relish. Hearings to confirm\u00a0a vice presidential nominee (Joan Allen) serve as a vehicle for Runyon to retaliate against the president and, if the\u00a0career of Senator Laine\u00a0Hanson (Allen)\u00a0is ruined, that’s just collateral damage. This is a darker, more disturbing version of The American President<\/a>.\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>However,\u00a0a marvelously inspirational\u00a0closing speech by the president (Jeff Bridges) provides catharsis and hope.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Coincidentally, I watched two Gary Oldman movies in quick succession.\u00a0In Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, he plays the subdued but heroic George Smiley. More recently, I watched The Contender. The multi-talented Oldman also produced the film. Oldman’s character, this time, is the polar opposite of Smiley.\u00a0Congressman Shelley Runyon, is malevolently and[Read more]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[2007,2006,400],"class_list":["post-16387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dvds","tag-congress","tag-gary-oldman","tag-politics"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd0CXx-4gj","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16387"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16387\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16525,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16387\/revisions\/16525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}