Let me reiterate for you: Oliver Stone is making a movie about George W. Bush. This is going to be quite popular overseas.
And those are his good ones.
Stone should have called it Dub-ya so that Dopers could actually search for any threads about it.
Yup. Word in Norway is positive and expectant.
Sadly, Germany expects a porno.
I think it looks pretty good. I like that he’s taking a satirical approach rather than a straight one. Stone, at his best, is a brilliant film maker. Who didn’t like Platoon or Wall Street? I know I’m supposed to hate him because JFK, while brililliantly made, was not particularly accurate. I don’t care. It was still a well made movie. So was Nixon. So was Born On the 4th of July. The guy can make a film once in a while. Also, Stone was fighting in Vietnam while GWB was deserting from the Alabama ANG, so he has more right than most directors to skewer him for it.
The problem is that Stone has never made a biopic that didn’t have some factual inaccuracies, whether big (JFK, Born on the 4th of July), medium (The Doors), or small (Nixon, WTC). All the film has to do is assert a couple of unprovable things (even just a line of dialogue or conversation that “never happened”), and the Bush-fans will use that to smear the broadest brush possible about whatever kind of propoganda they see it to be.
I suspect that it’ll play more as a comedy and less as a political hit-piece as the lefties would like, which means neither side will be particularly satisfied with it, despite what’s likely to be a wide assortment of terrific performances (which will pretty much echo the response to his RMN film). And like Nixon, it will do OK financially, but not Batman numbers, which will be enough for Fox to call it a failure (heck, we’ve already seen them falsely call a hit a bomb this year, simply because they didn’t like who was involved).
And while Stone has made some very good films in the past (IMHO), it’s been over a decade since that’s happened (to be generous). I sincerely doubt this will change things on that end.
Name ANY biopic that doesn’t have factual inaccuracies.
:rolleyes:
The difference is, you can have factual inaccuracies for unavoidable reasons or you can have them because you had an agenda and invented things.
Exactly. But most inaccuracies are driven by commercial reasons (condensing timelines, simplifying characters, manufacturing details, whitewashing controversies) to make the film more enjoyable.
But any inaccuracies in this film will be seen as agenda-driven. And one is all they need to dismiss the film as a whole, no matter how penetrating or observant or “truthful” it might be otherwise.
See, there’s a perfect example of making shit up to suit your agenda.
Other than JFK, Stone has no history of doing that. Nixon was pretty accurate.
What did I make up? Are you not aware that Oliver Stone is a Vietnam vet? Platoon was based on his real experiences.
How about this: “Stone was fighting in Vietnam while GWB was avoiding service abroad by using political connections to stay stateside in the Alabama ANG.” Cite
I’m not so sure that the Wiki statistics on Bush’s approval ratings are accurate. I tried to keep up with what his approval ratings were and I didn’t hear anything in the lower 20s. I have read several times previously that Truman had the lowest rating ever for a president at 24. This article says that Hoover had it at 23.
Does anyone have another source for Bush at 19 or Hoover at 23? I am unfamiliar with this particular polling source also.
I have no problem with the ranking by historians of President Bush.
I saw W last night.
It was a really great movie. I don’t have a lot of time to discuss it because of this whole pesky thing about having to work today, but here goes.
Brolin made a great W. The movie never portrayed him as evil. He was played with a clueless type of stupid. One that desperately thought he was doing the right thing, trying to constantly win his father’s approval and even beat both him and Jed at their own game.
The script constantly inserted real life Bush quotes into random places. Oh and the soundtrack was fantastic. The constant “Robin Hood” theme cracked me up.
All the supporting characters were dead on in their portrayal. It was a mockery, sure, but not in an SNL skit way. The characters all really looked sounded and acted like their real life counterparts.
The only “Hero” of the movie was Colin Powell and that’s because nearly every single line Stone had him utter was the Voice Of Reason That Got Ignored.
OK, sorry, gotta stop now. But I do recommend this. Does it come out this Friday?
I think the timing of the release will probably hurt the film.
In terms of quality, based only on the trailers, I suspect it will suffer from confusion of tone. On the one hand, being an Oliver Stone biopic, I kind of expect it to be a somewhat serious (if biased and not entirely accurate) movie. But the trailers and casting make it seem almost like a parody. I am really interested in seeing a Bush biopic, but I’m not convinced this is the one. I will watch it when it makes it to cable though, or possibly in theaters if the reviews merit it.
Come to think of it though, maybe the disparity of tone is appropriate. Bush’s presidency has also supposed to have been serious, but appeared at times like a parody.
I understand Zaph Bebblebrox so much better now. Someone needs to do a HGTTG/W parody.
Huh? Are you at all familiar with the Oliver Stone oeuvre?
You’re right in that the trailer depicted it more as a parody. But it’s not a parody. It’s not a biography either. It’s accurate in terms of what it portrays. The facts it presents and the order in which things happen. Would all the conversations have gone how they’re portrayed on screen? No. Is everyone’s motive shown properly? Maybe not.
But the film as presented fills in the gaps with a rather reasonable and plausible story of how Bush got from A to B to C.
Regardless of one’s political agenda, the story of GWB is, in an appalling way, quite amazing and very American. Tell it without any exaggeration and as accurately as possible, and it’ll still sound made-up.
(Like that scene where a reporter asks the President, after several disastrous years in office, to name a mistake he’s made – and the President draws a blank. That would seem implausible if I didn’t remember it happening.)