Saturday night, rather than stay at home and watch the Red Sox vs. Rays tilt in the American League Championship Series, a group of my neighborhood friends went to the multiplex to see Oliver Stone’s new movie “W.” Given the mounting fervor of the election season, it seemed like a good move for some thoughtful entertainment before sitting around a living room, dissecting the state of the nation.
That would be “nation” in both the United States and Red Sox varieties.
My first review after the credits rolled was “that is two hours of my life I won’t be getting back.” As a movie, “W” isn’t stellar filmmaking. Granted, there are some fascinating performances–led not by Josh Brolin, who is just interesting enough as the 43rd President of the United States, but rather by Richard Dreyfuss who is so creepy as Dick Cheney to make your skin crawl, Toby Jones who makes Karl Rove just down right worm-like, and perhaps most unsung, Scott Glen–whose portrayal of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld could be a character ripped right out of that movie classic “Dr. Strangelove”
But if there is a figure in the movie that was put in the most surprising light, it would be the turn by Jeffrey Wright as General Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State from 2001 to 2005. Wright captures the struggle of Powell with his transition from hailed military leader under Bush the father–to a torn political figure under “W” who tries to be a voice for reason, but is ultimately swept up in the winds of war that ultimately prove to be created as a special effect to influence the opinion of voters in America and leaders in the rest of the world.
The film “W”, like so many cinematic efforts, has promise in its first reel. But as the movie continues it gets lost in what appears to be director Stone’s effort to tell a story in a drama-as-documentary fashion that will prove his point about the flaws of the people involved, as well as their political motivations. Ultimately, it felt more like one of those old episodes of “You Are There”, where CBS’s Walter Cronkite would narrate a chapter in history that was played out by actors in a television studio.
All of this would be interesting enough for me, having gone to bed late Saturday night after the movie was followed by a couple of beverages, some time in our neighbor’s new hot tub, then watching the Red Sox force a game seven, and the Governor of Alaska being mistaken for Tina Fey by Alec Baldwin on “Saturday Night Live.”
But then to wake up on Sunday morning and see that the aforementioned Colin Powell had in real life gone on “Meet the Press”. After basically calling out his Republican party and it’s Presidential nominee for lurching to the far right in a naked bid to retain the office through a campaign of fear, intolerance and ineptitude, the General delivers the “shock and awe” announcement that he will be voting for the Democrat candidate on November 4th.
While it’s not quite the moment when actor Slim Pickens as Major TJ Kong rides cowboy style atop a nuclear bomb being dropped onto Commies in the crescendo of “Dr. Strangelove”, it’s pretty close.