‘W’ hits big screen

NBC
Published: October 17, 2008

At the height of election season, comes a new film based on the presidency of George W. Bush.
‘W’ is the latest from Director Oliver Stone.
You’d think with the name Oliver Stone in the credits about a sitting president, especially this one, that w would be just a polemic, a biased condemnation of a president with a 28% approval rating.

But no, Oliver Stone’s movie, with Josh Brolin positively brilliant in the title role, is ironically a sympathetic portrait at times of a troubled man who hated or still hates his father and turned his life around.

We flash forward and backwards.

In one scene he met his future wife Laura, played by Elizabeth Banks.
Then, as president, he gives the go ahead to invade Iraq.
Later we shift to the cabinet room when the disaster of the Iraq war has come to the fore.

Scott Glenn plays Rumsfeld while Richard Dreyfuss is perfect as Cheney.
Movie critic Jeffrey Lyons said, “W” Presents a surprisingly poignant, complex picture of a president in conflict with his personal demons, and his eventual realization of horrible mistakes, and of what he thinks were good intentions gone tragically wrong.