SOME films are wrecked by an unbelievable plot.
And this latest Oliver Stone movie about a boozy, unemployable schlub who somehow becomes US President would be just such a film.
Were it not true.
George W. Bush might have a couple of months left in office but that hasn’t stopped Stone knocking out a biopic.
It’s obviously a rush job. Filming began in spring so it would be finished for the election, which is apparently sometime soon.
But like the man himself, this film should not be misunderestimated.
Cos this crazy, slapdash, boggle-eyed hatchet job just might be one of THE essential movies of the year.
W. kicks off in 2003 with Bush chatting with his cronies in the Oval Office, trying to decide whether the phrase “Axis of Evil” sounds too sinister to use in a speech.
It’s a low-key intro. But man oh man, is it a sight to behold. It showcases what this film is all about—the performances.
Josh Brolin, as W. himself, we’ll come to in a minute. Richard Dreyfuss (aka Hooper from Jaws) is a terrifying Vice-President Dick Cheney. By crikey, with those beady eyes and that thorny grin, it looks like he could take a chunk out of a Great White himself.
Jeffrey Wright (CIA agent Felix Leiter in the new Bond movies) plays a likeable Secretary of State Colin Powell. Scott Glenn from the third Bourne movie is a just-sleazy-enough Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld, and the reliably brilliant Toby Jones is Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove. Then there’s Thandie Newton as National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice.
She looks incredible. Or rather she doesn’t—cos those smouldering eyes and that killer smile are nowhere to be seen.
Instead she’s suited and booted and rasping her lines through false teeth with a voice like a parched camel.
And she finally proves what I’ve suspected for some time—Thandie Newton is ace even in a non-hot role.
After the opening, Stone flits between Bush’s early adulthood—from his days as a hard-drinking Harvard frat boy through to Alc-Anon and working on his dad’s presidential campaign team—and more recent sequences such as him “masterminding” the War on Terror and repeatedly fantasising about being a baseball hero.
In truth, it’s a bit of a jumble. But the individual scenes work beautifully, particularly an amusing and pretty darn sweet barbecue scene where Dubya meets his future wife Laura (the lovely Elizabeth Banks).
And there’s a truly superb bit after an AA meeting where Bush chats to Pastor Earle Hudd (character-actor Stacy Keach) about his struggle with booze.
It’s subtle, touching and tells you all you need to know about what makes Bush tick. And crucially it DOESN’T make a fool of him for his religious beliefs or hard- drinking past. That reluctance to go down the point-and-mock route is what makes W. work. It would have been so easy to do a Dead Ringers, and paint Bush as a chimp-faced, squinting dunce—but Brolin and Stone are aiming much higher.
Yes, we do get all the classic bungles —and fans of “fool me once”, “is our children learning?” and the pretzel incident will not leave disappointed. But in the main, the cheap gags take a back seat to some incredibly well-thought- out character work.
The lion’s share of the credit must go to the excellent Josh Brolin, who delivers a frankly jaw-dropping performance.
It’s not merely a great impression with hair, walk, drawl, nervous laugh and peering eyes all present and correct.
Brolin’s Bush is rounded, credible, charming and completely human—probably with more depth and complexity than the bloke himself.
And if there’s any justice in the world, it will net him an Oscar nomination and at least one other significant gong nod.
The right-on brigade will moan W. gives Bush an easy ride, just as political bores will complain it has been made too early.
But frankly it doesn’t matter, because the story is complete—covering Bush’s improbable rise and equally improbable fall.
And what the film lacks in polish it more than makes up for with wit, subtlety, top- notch writing and superb performances.
You’ll go, as I did, to laugh and feel vaguely terrified. But you’ll leave feeling moved, amused, challenged and impressed, and with a new-found feeling of sympathy for the departing US president.
That’s one hell of an achievement, cos it takes just 131 minutes. And that’s more than the real one managed in eight years.
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