W. Reviewed

Say what you will about Oliver Stone, the man’s got passion. Sure, he lacks subtlety, as anyone who had their senses attacked by Natural Born Killers can attest. Sometimes he takes tremendous risks in bringing a controversial political figure or era to life (JFK, Nixon). Other times he doesn’t take enough risk, as evidenced by his politically tepid World Trade Center.  But underlying both his triumphs and his failures as a filmmaker is an indelible passion to bring compelling stories to the screen. W. is a movie branded with that passion, and almost succeeds because of it. In the end though, it is simply a case of bad timing that renders this otherwise gripping film strangely hollow. Most people are done with Bush: with the country in shambles following his eight years in office and the next Presidential election virtually around the corner, people simply want to look ahead, not back. At the same time, the movie covers events that are far too fresh to be chronicled as history.  It is weirdly unsettling to see the very political landscape we’ve been living in for the last eight years sketched up on screen. As a political statement W. is fairly ineffective, but as a portrait of one of the most scrutinized men in recent history it is fair-minded and surprisingly earnest.

Stone’s George W. Bush (Josh Brolin) is a character straight out of Shakespeare; a tragically flawed man who is constantly reinventing himself beneath the pressure of a disappointed father. Through the extensive use of flashbacks, this Bush Jr. becomes a dynamic figure, much more than the cartoonish figurehead that he could have easily been portrayed as. We watch as he rushes a fraternity at Yale, tries his hand at oil rigging (the first among many short-lived jobs), meets his future wife Laura (Elizabeth Banks) at a barbeque, and finds his way to political office in the footsteps of his father (a miscast James Cromwell). It is this last bit—attempting to live up to the elder Bush’s expectations—that seemingly shapes Bush Jr. the most. Throughout the entire movie, he flounders about, desperate for his father’s approval or praise. Yet in his “Daddy issues” Bush is humanized. His struggle with alcoholism, the spiritual journey he undertakes to find Christianity again: these reflect Bush’s attempts to both separate and reconcile himself with a father that has done it all before, and better.

Brolin is easily the best thing about the film. He has the mannerisms and vocal inflections down pat, but he never lets his Dubya become a caricature, a mere imitation. He brings an endearing sincerity to the role; his Bush is a well-meaning simple man who makes the severe mistake of surrounding himself with the most corrupt and self-seeking administration of perhaps all of American history. To take on such a group, Stone has assembled an impressive cast, of which Richard Dreyfuss and Jeffrey Wright stand out in particular. Dreyfuss’ Chaney is menacingly manipulative yet understated. Wright as Colin Powell serves to redeem the character of our Secretary of State; he is thoughtful and perceptive, and is the lone sane voice in the debate scenes about the Iraq War. The only depiction of a real-life member of the Bush administration that falls short is Thandie Newton as a laughably cartoonish Condoleezza Rice; she is pure mimicry and fails to bring anything of substance to the role.

In one of the film’s most tightly wound scenes, when debating whether or not to invade Iraq, Powell asks simply: “Why?” In regards to Stone’s decision to release his movie when it’s subject was still in office—why, indeed. The film doesn’t take on a strong enough political stance to impact the nearing election or be otherwise relevant to today’s politics. But maybe that was never Stone’s intention. Perhaps he simply wanted to create an even-handed look at the man who became our 43^rd President—and leave it to the American public to wonder how they could have let that man stumble into such a role.