The Beltway Follies

By RICHARD SCHICKEL

TITLE: DAVE

DIRECTOR: IVAN REITMAN

WRITER: GARY ROSS

THE BOTTOM LINE: A genial, expertly played political comedy proves that the spirit of Mr. Smith still lives.

The President, the press secretary reports blandly, has suffered "a slight circulatory problem of the head." That's spin doctor -- better yet, parody spin doctor -- for a stroke that has left the Commander in Chief an aspiring kumquat.

Time for an orderly transition of power, right? Wrong. Time for a cover-up. Time for Dave Kovic (Kevin Kline), a presidential look-alike, to step into President Bill Mitchell's not exactly unfillable shoes. Dave is the owner of a soft- (not to say bleeding-) hearted employment agency whose uncanny resemblance to The Man has led to a nice little sideline, impersonating him first at the openings of car dealerships and other lowball promotional fests, then, at the Secret Service's behest, at a real presidential function.

Hey, Dave -- how'd you like to make a full-time job of it? This suits the Machiavellian purposes of chief of staff Bob Alexander (played with joyously evil relish by Frank Langella). As his name suggests, he combines the less attractive traits of Bob Haldeman and Alexander Haig. He's been running Mitchell (whom Kline also plays), and he's not about to abandon power gracefully. Besides, this putz should be a pushover.

Obviously, Alexander has never seen Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. He is therefore ignorant of Hollywood's potent, immemorial belief (and the nation's wistful hope) that innocence can reform the capital's swampy soul. It's a dear dream, and working off it Ivan Reitman and Gary Ross have fashioned a dear and funny movie.

Once Dave has mastered the President's swivel chair (he has a tendency to tip too far back in it), he starts mastering the other instruments of power as well. Budget reform, an improved day-care program, a bold new jobs program, even the banishment of corruption -- all these he achieves by the simple assertion of guileless right thinking. He even manages to woo Mrs. Mitchell (Sigourney Weaver) out of the separate bedroom and angry silence into which her real husband has forced her to retreat.

There is some sentimentality in this, but it is lightly, genially stated. And it is balanced with a sharp comic shrewdness. Reitman has succeeded in recruiting all sorts of prominent people -- ranging from sitting Senators to the McLaughlin Group to Oliver Stone, contributing a paranoid slant on good- heartedness -- to satirize their own and, more important, the media's self- importance. They impart to Dave just the topical edge it requires.

Not that one wants to take anything away from its professional actors. The Bushiness of Kline's President is well-observed, and the woolliness of his Dave contains bristles too. He's warm without being entirely cuddlesome. Weaver has a veteran wife's weary wariness down perfectly. Ving Rhames as a Secret Service man allowing Dave to melt his professional steeliness, Kevin Dunn as the press secretary for whom "no comment" is a moral statement, and Charles Grodin as a CPA appalled by federal accounting practices complete one of the best comic ensembles in years. Under Reitman's unforced and confident direction, they ground improbable fantasy in very human, very winning believability.