Everything you ever wanted to know about the presidential primary but were too confused to ask! As well as entertaining - and it does, you can see this film as a lesson in the American voting system, although to understand it doesn't make the end result any different - we find out it's a dirty business full of compromises, no surprise there. 

The fourth directorial from George Clooney, who also stars and produces, follows the story of Stephen Meyers, played by Ryan Gosling (surely this year's hardest working actor?), an ambitious campaign press secretary who finds himself involved in a politician scandal that threatens to ruin his democrat candidate's (Mike Morris, played by Clooney) shot at the presidency.

Despite the casting of Gosling and Clooney, it's not the sexiest of settings - this is real politics. As the saying (apparently) goes, "as Ohio goes, so goes the nation" and so Cincinnati is backdrop as Morris attempts to gain the all important lead.

Morris is suave and handsome, he's also a democrat, so we automatically like him (apparently his spotty tie also helps). However, as everyone would undoubtedly find if Clooney himself took a shot at presidency (bad luck, guys, he's already said he won't be), there's a skeleton in his closet, which Meyers uncovers (clue: it involves the minxy Evan Rachel Wood, who's a damn sight better looking than Monica Lewinsky).

As ambitious as he is, 30-year-old Meyer, is a loyal - albeit slightly smug - chap, something that contrasts brilliantly with his much more seasoned boss (Philip Seymour Hoffman). He even describes Morris as he friend, which makes his aforementioned discovery all the more shocking. It's this display of idealism that spells his downfall - he breaks that number one rule of not keeping his mouth shut when he meets with the rival candidate's own campaign manager, played by Paul Giamatti, to tell him that he's not interested in a job, a move that comes across as egotistical to his boss.

And so Meyer's loyalty is truly tested as he decided what to do with the explosive secret he knows.

As much as we learn about the election, Ides of March is more like a coming of age film with the primary as the backdrop - something that might be of relief to potential cinema-goers who don't want to be bogged down with politics on a Friday night (it comes in at a snappy 90 minutes). While Clooney has said that the title was only taken from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar because the primary fell on the same day as the play's climax (15 March), it's as much about back-stabbing in the metophorical sense - and even a-political types will ponder what they'd do in Meyers shoes.

Cimema votes have been swung so far; on one hand, there's great acting (although we do think both Gosling and Clooney are stronger in lighter roles - The Descendants and Crazy Stupid love, for instance), but the script does get a bit bogged down with trying to be too smart whilst letting the plot twists stray on the predictable side. But then again politicians are predictable, as depressing as that is.