Interesting choice of headline for Al Jazeera's article on the controversial "Death Of A President," and pretty controversial itself, considering the source: "Death Becomes Bush." Well, that's one way to distance yourself from al Qaeda.
Al-Jazeera is hangin' at the Toronto Film Festival, and reports that the reception to the snuff mock-doc has been good (well, really, that's what it is). The film openend in Toronto on Sunday night (and please stop for a moment and imagine the reaction had it opened on September 11th) and has just sold its US distribution rights for $1 million.
The film depicts Bush being shot by a sniper, which makes this quote from director Gabriel Range seem just a tad disingenuous: "I really don't think that anyone would get the idea of assassinating Bush from this film." No, of course not, what a silly thing to think.
Two notes on this film: As I have said before, I think it's important not to confuse freedom of speech with political dissent — sure, great, make your little movie but the legitimacy of its existence does not automatically translate into legitimacy of message. The link that the movie seems to try to establish (and I've not seen it, I'm going off Range's comments) is between the act of assassination and the state of affairs under the Bush administration ("It is an oblique look at the ways the United States has changed since 9/11"). That is a false link; I don't think I'm going out on a limb here in noting that people who kill presidents tend to be deranged individuals with slight mental problems (it's true; if you don't believe me, you've obviously not been taking in enough musical theater).
But besides all that, apparently the film commits an even more heinous crime: It's not that good. Here's a blistering review from James Rocchi at Cinematical (the former Mr. Netflix) that would deter even the most ardent milita man:
It's a tired, tedious mix of procedural-style storytelling, in which we're asked to engage in a slow-crawl mystery: Who really killed George W. Bush in October, 2007?.... Death of a President plays like a mix of the worst parts of C.S.I. (blood, guts, tech-babble) and Ken Burns (long-winded interviews, easy sentiment, visual stasis). Nor does it work as satire or commentary -- it's loaded with too much tedium to be shocking, and watching the film's clanging, wooden attempts at political allegory or cultural analysis is cringe-inducing....You can -- and should be able to -- make art about the tragedy of any person's death, President to pauper. But Death of a President isn't art, or even entertainment: It's the art-house, indie-doc equivalent of Snakes on a Plane, where someone thought of a single idea and then, it seems based on the end-resulting film, stopped thinking altogether.
