Movie Review: "W."

Oliver Stone, for me, has always been an extremely over rated director. He has a knack for taking good, sometimes exceptional, scripts and adding his own flair that takes from the movie from potentially excellent to powerfully awful. He likes to focus on making politically-themed movies, but even when he ventures away from that, he still creates massive failures. His last film, "World Trade Center," was nothing more than average. His last venture away from politics, "Alexander," was widely panned. "Any Given Sunday" was a disappointment, and his most monumental failure was his bastardization of Tarantino's wonderful script for "Natural Born Killers."

Returning to his most successful roots making films chronicling the lives of politicians, Stone returns with his latest film "W.," a film about one of the most controversial Presidents ever, our current President, George W. Bush. Not one to stray too far from the norm, Stone delivers yet another aggressively average film. While the man's talent is undeniable, his style leaves much to be desired.

For starters, Stone portrays Bush Jr. as a victim: A victim of religion, a victim of Dick Cheney and Karl Rove, and a victim of his father. All of Bush's accomplishments (or lack thereof) are done out of a painful desire to not only please his father, but surpass him. This is of course a very under-used theme in Hollywood. Anyway, Bush is jealous of his father's favoritism toward his brother. No matter how much he wants to please his father, his reckless behavior keeps causing him to screw up. He fails at essentially every single thing he does, from the military, to college, to an attempt to run for Congress. One of the few interesting moments in the film is Bush's devastation after his loss in the race for Congress. The Democratic candidate painted Bush as rich and out of touch with the common Texan and the common Christian. Afterward, Bush vowed that he would never be "out-Texas'd or out-Christian'd" again.

Bush then decides to give up alcohol and find God. Finding strength through God, Bush finds the motivation to run for Governor of Texas and finally succeeds. Seeing weakness in his father's handling of Saddam Hussein during his own Presidency, Bush says that God has decided it's his turn to give it a go in the White House. Unfortunately, the film paints Bush as a puppet, and I don't buy it. Once in the White House, it seems all of the decisions are made by God, Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and Donald Rumsfeld. Bush just blindly follows orders. The film essentially relieves Bush of all responsibility for his actions while in the White House. After all, he's too simple to know what to do on his own.

One of the few shining moments of the film is Josh Brolin's outstanding portrayal of the President. Following up his performance in "No Country For Old Men," Brolin is really on a roll. He's mastered all of Bush's mannerisms, his voice, and even his walk. Although Brolin has been around for quite some time, he's finally starting to hit his peak. His next film, "Milk," is very high on my list of must-see's. He does not star, but he plays a supporting role in a film about Harvey Milk, the first openly gay politician. A nearly unrecognizable Sean Penn stars, and the film takes place in San Francisco (surprise surprise). But I digress. Brolin has really been phenomenal as of late. Other than Brolin's performance, the film brings little else worthwhile to the table.

One of Stone's go-to moves is his tendency to feature symbolic, sometimes surreal, dream-like sequences in his movies. This is one of the many ways in which he ruined "Natural Born Killers," and he goes to the well too often in this film as well. The dream-like sequences are corny, unimaginative, and bash you over the head with an obvious point. We get it, Oliver. Dream sequences don't make you deep or intellectual, and when poorly done as in this case, they just trigger frequent eye rolls and deep sighs.

In addition to my previously mentioned point about his portrayal of the soon-to-be-former President, Stone also seems to not really be aware of what dialogue should stay in the film, and what should be left on the cutting room floor. I have never been one to complain about dialogue. The average film goer wants more actions and less talking. I, however, would almost prefer the opposite when it's well done. This film tries to find a proper balance and fails. There are long war room sequences that feature lengthy bouts of teeth-grindingly boring dialogue. These scenes weren't just boring, they were BOOOOOOOOOOORIIIIIIING!!!!!!!!!! I can't recall any time in recent memory when I had so trouble paying attention to the movie. I nearly walked out early in the film, completely prepared to come home and write a one-star review about how the film was so bad that I couldn't sit through it. I stuck it out, though, and the film did get better and managed to attain levels of mediocrity.

There are many other problems with this movie, including Thandie Newton's unintentionally comedic portrayal of Condoleeza Rice, but we all have other things to do. Basically, this is a two-star movie with four-star aspirations. If you're into politics, you won't learn much, if anything, you didn't already know. If you think this is a comedy, think again. A film about George W. Bush will of course have several funny moments, but Stone took this film in a far more serious direction. If you're a Stone fan, or someone desperately looking for a scapegoat on which to blame all of Bush's failures, you may like it. Otherwise, save your 10 bucks and wait until this is on DVD.