Death of A President (2006)

“Finding the source of the leak is the focus of a massive investigation.” – Robert H. Maguire

Number of Times Seen – 1 (13 Jul 2016)

Brief Synopsis – A fictional account of a future investigation into the assassination of then-President George W. Bush.

My Take on it – I found the premise of this fictional documentary to be quite interesting, but they make a number of missteps that takes away from a potentially great impact.

First of all, the choice to use a sitting President as the subject of a futuristic documentary investigation doesn’t work well enough because it reeks from political reasoning instead of something more concrete.

Had they chosen a fictional President they would have given the story much more credibility even though they would then lose the impact of using real policies familiar to the viewer.

Ultimately, the choice of Bush was detrimental to the story because it seems like they were going for political assassination insteda of a real assassination.

The way that this film is presented with “real” footage combined with “real” interviews with witnesses and staff members is hit and miss. Some feel genuine and other feel too fake.

The film is too disjointed and doesn’t flow well which stems from the fact that they apparently didn’t plan it all out well enough which is a shame because like I said earlier, this could have been so much better because the potential with this kind of theme is vast.

Unfortunately, they weren’t able to capture that magic here and sadly, give us something pretty mediocre.

Bottom Line – Interesting premise, but it doesn’t work as well as it could have. I think the idea to use a real sitting President was detrimental to the story and it might have been served better had they used a fictional President.  The interviews of the staff and witnesses are interesting to watch even though the story doesn’t flow as well as it could.

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – The majority of the actors in the film were not told the premise of the movie. The working title for the film was “D.O.A.P.,” and the actors were not told what the plot was, except for their specific scenes. (From IMDB)

Rating – BAFTA Worthy

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