Lights, Camera, Legislative Action: Top 10 Movies About Presidents

One of the most seminal moments for many Americans is the first time they get to vote for the President of the United States. You feel like you really matter in the legislative process, and you hope whoever you pick doesn't suck so bad that they make a movie about them.

You want them to make a movie celebrating them, or at least chronicling them fighting off terrorists who take over their plane.

Anyway, there are a lot of great movies about presidents, and I wanted to put together my top 10.

This is not in the order of which movies are better; it's more like which movies have the best depictions of presidents, if that makes sense.

Let's dive in.

1. Lincoln (2012)

• The President: Abraham Lincoln (Daniel Day-Lewis)
• Director: Steven Spielberg
• Writer: Tony Kushner
• Key Cast: Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, David Strathairn, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, James Spader, Tommy Lee Jones.

This is such an emotional look at who Abraham Lincoln was to so many people. Steven Spielberg’s masterpiece doesn't cover the president's entire life; instead, it focuses on his grueling political battle to pass the 13th Amendment. And you get to see how that shaped his final months and his legend. Daniel Day-Lewis delivers what many consider the definitive portrayal of the 16th President. He's so funny, wise, and likable.

2. All the President's Men (1976)

• The President: Richard Nixon (archival footage)
• Director: Alan J. Pakula
• Writer: William Goldman
• Key Cast: Robert Redford, Dustin Hoffman, Jack Warden, Martin Balsam, Hal Holbrook, Jason Robards.

Okay, so this is a movie about a President who barely appears, except in news reels. The thriller follows journalists Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein as they uncover the Watergate scandal and what it means to the legacy of Nixon, who is implicated. It shows how important the job is without ever seeing someone do the job.

3. Air Force One (1997)

• The President: James Marshall (Harrison Ford)
• Director: Wolfgang Petersen
• Writer: Andrew W. Marlowe
• Key Cast: Harrison Ford, Gary Oldman, Glenn Close, Wendy Crewson, William H. Macy.

I don't think we'll ever have a president as badass as Harrison Ford in this movie. But if we did, I'd vote for him a third time. This combat-decorated President has to retake his own plane from terrorists and save his wife and child, plus hold together the world. It also gave us the iconic line: "Get off my plane!"

4. Frost/Nixon (2008)

• The President: Richard Nixon (Frank Langella)
• Director: Ron Howard
• Writer: Peter Morgan
• Key Cast: Frank Langella, Michael Sheen, Kevin Bacon, Rebecca Hall, Toby Jones, Sam Rockwell.

We could have had a whole list of movies about Nixon. This one is set after Nixon’s resignation and dramatizes the 1977 interviews between British journalist David Frost and the disgraced former President. It’s a tense, intellectual boxing match that explores the psyche of a man who lost everything. Nixon was smart enough to become president but not smart enough to keep his nose clean.

5. JFK (1991)

• The President: John F. Kennedy (flashbacks/footage)
• Director: Oliver Stone
• Writers: Oliver Stone, Zachary Sklar
• Key Cast: Kevin Costner, Kevin Bacon, Tommy Lee Jones, Laurie Metcalf, Gary Oldman, Sissy Spacek.

I hate to be the guy who says it, but I love a good conspiracy theory. And the ones surrounding the murder of JFK are pretty amazing. Oliver Stone’s controversial epic focuses on the investigation into the Kennedy assassination and has so many moving parts within it. The "trust no one" atmosphere makes it a staple of political cinema. And I don't know if any of the facts are real, I just love that we live in a country where we can ask all the big questions.

6. The American President (1995)

• The President: Andrew Shepherd (Michael Douglas)
• Director: Rob Reiner
• Writer: Aaron Sorkin
• Key Cast: Michael Douglas, Annette Bening, Martin Sheen, Michael J. Fox, Richard Dreyfuss.

What would it be like dating someone in the Oval Office? It's kind of wild, but before he gave us The West Wing , Aaron Sorkin wrote this charming rom-com about a widowed President falling for an environmental lobbyist. It’s an idealistic, "Sorkinian" look at the humanity behind the heavy title and what it means to care about someone when you have all the power in the world.

7. Thirteen Days (2000)

• The President: John F. Kennedy (Bruce Greenwood)
• Director: Roger Donaldson
• Writer: David Self
• Key Cast: Kevin Costner, Bruce Greenwood, Steven Culp, Dylan Baker.

I didn't pick this movie for the accents, which are notoriously horrendous. This film offers a nerve-wracking, fly-on-the-wall perspective of the Cuban Missile Crisis and how JFK helped us avert it and find cooler heads to prevail. It captures the sheer weight of responsibility when the world is literally 13 days away from nuclear war.

8. Dave (1993)

• The President: Bill Mitchell / Dave Kovic (Kevin Kline)
• Director: Ivan Reitman
• Writer: Gary Ross
• Key Cast: Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver, Frank Langella, Kevin Dunn, Ving Rhames, Ben Kingsley.

Man, if you haven't seen this movie, drop what you're doing and watch it ASAP. It's a feel-good classic that follows an ordinary guy who happens to look exactly like the President. When the Commander in Chief is knocked out, the normal guy is hired to fill in for him and actually starts running the country better than the original. It's so funny.

9. Vice (2018)

• The President: George W. Bush (Sam Rockwell)
• Director: Adam McKay
• Writer: Adam McKay
• Key Cast: Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Steve Carell, Sam Rockwell, Tyler Perry, Jesse Plemons.

Look, this is technically a biopic of Dick Cheney, but the film offers a fascinating (and biting) look at the Bush administration and whether or not that president was in control the whole time. Sam Rockwell’s performance as "W" is a perfect blend of caricature and sincerity.

10. Dr. Strangelove (1964)

• The President: Merkin Muffley (Peter Sellers)
• Director: Stanley Kubrick
• Writers: Stanley Kubrick, Terry Southern, Peter George
• Key Cast: Peter Sellers, George C. Scott, Sterling Hayden, Keenan Wynn, Slim Pickens.

In perhaps the greatest political satire ever made, Peter Sellers plays a mild-mannered, utterly overwhelmed President trying to stop a nuclear apocalypse. He's overmatched, not very smart, and can't do anything about it. It's what makes a movie like this the perfect comedy.

Summing It All Up

These are my picks for the best movies about presidents, but I bet you have a few you think should be on this list.

Let me know what you think in the comments.