I think Clinton was already 100% committed to a political career even before 1972. He had been a staff aide to Senator Fulbright of Arkansas in the 1960s, had visited Washington DC in 1963 as part of a civic program for high-school students (there is a photograph of him shaking JFK's hand). Also he wrote a letter in 1969, at age 22, to a retired Army officer explaining his desire for a political career. That letter actually was published in the 1992 campaign, even though Clinton seemed to have believed that it had been destroyed.
I've never heard before that Bill Clinton "moved to California" in 1972. I thought it was Hillary who moved to Arkansas to be with him. But I admit it's been a long time since I read about their lives so you could be right about that.
With all that said, I daresay Clinton did watch "The Candidate" when it came out, even though I have never heard him talk about it. And Clinton does strike me as the sort of person who would make a conscious effort to incorporate some of the mannerisms and speaking style of a movie-character into his own personality. So yes, that could be the basis for the similarities you observed.
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