'All the King's Men' is just a one-note ego trip

There's one Penn too many in Sean Penn's remake of "All the King's Men," and it's not Robert Penn Warren.

Warren wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning book that provided the basis for this film and the Oscar-winning 1949 version that won best picture, best supporting actress and, most especially, best actor for Broderick Crawford's towering portrayal of Willie Stark.

Sony Pictures 'All the King's Men' F The verdict: A dreadful, ego-driven botch. Director: Steven Zaillian Starring: Sean Penn, Jude Law, Kate Winslet, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Hopkins, James Gandolfini, Patricia Clarkson Run time: 120 minutes Release date: Sept. 22, 2006 Rating: PG-13 for an intense sequence of violence, sexual content and partial nudity. See showtimes On the web Official movie site View the trailer    Trailers require Quicktime Rate 'All the King's Men'   Go see it   Make it a matinee   Wait to rent   Don't bother Voter Limit: Once per Hour View Poll Results

In the book, Stark is a thinly fictionalized version of Depression-era Louisiana Gov. Huey Long, whose man-of-the-people mob rule and megalomaniacal ambition made him one of the most memorable — and memorably corrupt — politicians in American history.

Willie is a big, juicy, red-meat role, and it's no wonder Penn would want to play it. It's pretty much because of Penn's yen for the part that this remake exists.

And it's appalling. Mostly because Penn is appalling. He has no sense of Willie's charm, of what drew people to him. Instead, he's all bluster and paunch. When giving a speech, his eccentric body language recalls John Belushi as Joe Cocker or, better still, Elaine's dancing on "Seinfeld." There's no richness here, no layers, just a one-note ego trip in which the camera circles Penn's florid, ranting face, coming in for a series of full-screen close-ups while the music swells.

This isn't acting. It's caricature. Instead of Willie Stark, we get Foghorn Leghorn.

Willie's story is told from the point of view of Jack Burden (Jude Law), a child of privilege working as a reporter until he figures out what to do with his life. Sent by his editor to cover a small-town nobody running for office in Nowhere, Louisiana, he's impressed by Willie's honesty, idealism and naivetŽ. The cynic in him is drawn to a guy who drinks orange pop and calls his wife "Mother."

Willie loses, of course, but, because he appeals to the "hick" vote, as everyone calls it, he's set up as a straw horse in the governor's race, to split the rural vote. He loses again, but not before he learns he was used. And Will is a quick learner.

When he runs for governor a second time, he's found his voice — and his power. He wins. Is it the end of Willie Stark — the good, honest man we first met? Or is it the beginning — the launching pad for the demagogue already lurking within the orange-pop shell.

This movie doesn't know. And it doesn't care. Because there's no room for anything or anyone else in Penn's film — except, perhaps, snatches of a very uncomfortable and miscast Law, whose accent ebbs and flows with the Mississippi.

In the role of Sadie Burke, Willie's strategist-mistress (for which Mercedes McCambridge won a supporting Oscar), Patricia Clarkson is reduced to a whispery presence making Cassandra-ish pronouncements while downing a lot of liquor. Since Penn barely glances at her the entire picture, we pretty much have to take it on faith they're sleeping together because that's what we're told.

As Anne Stanton, the aristocrat whom Jack loves and Willie seduces, Kate Winslet barely makes an impression. She's introduced late in the movie and mostly in flashbacks, so we have very little sense of her relationship with Jack as a childhood friend or, for that matter, with Willie (again, Penn rarely grants her a look).

The rather substantial role of Winslet's brother, Adam (Mark Ruffalo), all but disappears. He's like an afterthought, a necessary plot detail and that's about it. Anthony Hopkins makes little impression and is given even less to do as a revered judge. And, most tellingly, James Gandolfini has about 10 lines and spends most of his time standing in the background as one of the back-room boys. Telling, I say, because, any actor who was paying attention would know better than to appear in a movie with someone who can play your role a lot better than you can. It is a measure of Penn's arrogance — or is it tunnel vision? — that he even allows Gandolfini, who has the bulk and presence of Willie Stark, in the same frame with him.

It must be said that Penn had help digging his grave. Writer-director Steven Zaillian ("Schindler's List," "Gangs of New York" and the unfortunate "Hannibal") has no idea how to tell this story. In the opening scene, he introduces us to a Willie already in full monster mode — ruthless, dealing dirty and determined to get his way, no matter what, or who, it takes. Then the movie travels back to five years earlier and there's the idealist. But it's too late. Our head is already too full of what he becomes to take Willie as he once was. This crucial misstep happens at the very start.

We never get the chance to sympathize with Willie, to be on his side, to believe in him. So we're not shocked by his betrayal — of us as much as the other characters. Bad Willie is precisely what we'd been told to expect. In his version, Crawford started small and kept growing until his sheer ego and malevolent brute force filled the screen. Penn starts small and gets smaller. And all the close-ups in the world can't change that.