I wanted to like this I really really did but somewhere along the way the train came off the tracks. I'm not exactly sure what Stone was trying to accomplish with this film. The trailers show this being an attack type biopic but what Stone and screenwriter Stanley Weiser came up with is anything but. Instead they portray W. as a victim of privilege, the unfavored son who succeeds only with the help of his reluctant father and a new found faith. Stone and Weiser show us a man who is flawed and misunderstood in his youth, becoming righteous and resolute in adulthood after he's born again. If you've seen the trailer then you've seen the most egregious attacks on Bush. Which when viewed in context within the film come of as mean spirited as a tickle fight between best friends. I always thought that Stone was a little left of center in his political views but now I'm rethinking that assumption.

The overall structure of the story with its staggered time line, bouncing between past and present, hinders the already incoherent story. Brolin was good as the older W but looked old and unconvincing as the younger. Banks was miscast as Laura, she didn't really add anything to a role that was underwritten. The unlikely standout in this is James Cromwell playing pappy Bush with a sense of stoic helplessness. While Ellyn Burstyn isn't manly enough to convincingly portray Barbra. As for the litany of actors portraying W's cabinet. They all came across as bad caricatures in a bad SNL sketch who's sole purpose is to remove any guilt or responsibility from W. I'm still puzzled as to why Stone even bothered with including them as prominently as he did. After the first scene in the war room they ceased being anything more than window dressing.

I'm beginning to think that Stone is losing his touch as an effective film maker after the failures of Alexander and WTC. In that he's playing it safe instead of trying to shake things up. Or maybe after living through the past seven and three quarter years I was hoping for a jugular shot. But W. is simply a revisionist version of history foist upon us before that history is fully written. Presenting a version of G W. B hard core conservatives will love and the rest of country will loath wrapped up in a film thats as incoherent and inconsistent as the man its profiling.

Grade D-

Well the most shocking thing Stone could've done with this film is actually take the side of Bush, and that's exactly what he did. With that being said, there's definitely some issues. I understand the motive for playing it straight and giving Bush a fair trial, but where the problem comes is that he doesn't apply that philosophy to the other members of the administration. Cheney might as well have EVIL painted across his forhead. I mean I know he goes by Darth Cheney, but you're taking it a bit far when you have him state that his plan is that the US never leaves Iraq and within 25 years he has them owning the entire middle east. Rumsfield and Rice mostly act as comic fodder. It was a nice touch making Powell almost tragic with the way he gives in, but the rest, I dunno. Stone seems to want to have his cake and eat it too, the sympathizing with the Bushes doesn't mix with that blatent messaging with the other members of the party, and the occasional moments of parody and comedy that would fit if the whole film was a satire, but with it being mostly dramatic, just feel out of place.

I also think he spent a little too much time in the last act showing news clippings and etc. of stuff we already knew, what made it worse was that he skipped the entire '90s to show us this... I would've rather had those scenes, then ended it when he got elected, with the flashforwards giving us all we need to know about the Iraq period.

For the most part though, it's just a pretty good drama, with a brilliant performance and a brilliant score. Brolin really is incredible here. He's not *exactly* Bush, but he gives his character so much layers and humanity that you don't need him to be. I much prefer this performance to Jamie Foxx in Ray, Hoffman in Capote, or Mirren in The Queen... it's more than just a great impersonation. I would almost give him the Oscar. Cromwell is also quite excellent as H.W., especially in the scene where he loses to Clinton. I think most of the acting was pretty solid, with the exception of Newton, I don't know what happened there, she was awful.

Overall, it's a good, flawed drama that tackles the material more unexpectadely than you'd expect when you heard Stone was making a Dubya movie.

3.5/5

I apologize upfront about the length.

W.

I really enjoyed this for the most part. The real reason this film works is the absolutely revelatory performance from Josh Brolin, who deserves awards consideration for his work done here. He's beyond phenomenal and gives the character a great deal of depth, evoking a surprising amount of sympathy as well. The supporting performances are also strong, mainly from James Cromwell and Elizabeth Banks, the latter of whom is kind of underused. The weakest performance as everyone already said comes from Thandie Newton, who is unintentionally hilarious here - a shame given how talented she is. I thought the first hour or so dealing with Bush's past was definitely the stronger portion - it was incredibly fascinating and entertaining as well. Once it got into modern-day territory it started to drag a bit. Still, a very well-directed, well-acted film - one worth seeing for Brolin's performance alone. B+

Thandie really is in worst of the year form here... It's as if she's in a different movie, the full on ridiculous parody we were all expecting when this was announced. She sounded like a chipmunk.

Yeah she was on the different end of the spectrum here. Wow. I think she missed the memo.

From what I've heard, there's a quote where Cromwell mentioned one of the actors came in with their own perception of how to play the character and wasn't listening to Stone's direction, and that he thought it led to a weaker performance. Had to be talking about Newton if it's true.

Its biggest problem is that it feels rushed. I mean, how long was it from premise to release? Less than a year? That's an insanely short production schedule and it shows. As a result, everything else in the film suffers. The plot meanders, jumps around chronologically and tonaly, and feels almost pointless. Indeed, this is symptomatic of the film as a whole. What was Stone's point in making this? To satirize Bush? To tell his tragic story? Merely to tell it "as it is"? It seems he had no idea, and thus neither do I.

About the only thing it really nails are the performances, but even they suffer from the schizophrenic tonality of the film. Brolin is brilliant, clearly trapped between the biopic and satire sensibilities, but still making his performance memorable and realistic without delving too much into imitation or melodrama. But from him the supporting cast splinters. Cromwell, Burstyn, Banks, Wright, Jones - all play it straight and serious and seem to fit the mould of biopic. But then you've got Glenn as the loopy Rumsfeld and Dreyfuss as Darth Cheney - clearly meant for comic fodder. And then Newton - WTF? - who makes Rice into a full-on parody, taking away from the intended seriousness of whatever scene she's in.

And the incredible leaping plot doesn't help matters either. It feels far too short to tell Bush's life story and also far too intimate to tell the tale of how they got into the Iraq quagmire. So instead it tries to tell both stories, successfully telling neither. Do we care that Bush could never get out of the shadow of his father? Does it matter that he got into Harvard and quit drinking and found Jesus? Not really. Bush is forced into the position of tragic hero when he's really not, basically absolving him of all blame while still mocking him endlessly.

Basically Stone can't decide what film he wants to make - satire or biopic - and thus it becomes neither, just hovering in some bizarre middle ground where Bush is both clown and hero, and the war is both comedy and tragedy. It's not a bad movie, per se, but it's not a particularly good one, either. It's just there.

What a disappointment. Anyone could have directed this. Bad film.

Premise? By premise do you mean "casting" and "filming", it doesn't take long. (http://www.criticsrant.com/archive/2008 ... iopic.aspx if you mean actual "premise" it's afew years. Face it, dramas without any fancy special effects take no time to shoot and a variable time to edit. It's not a big deal.


No, it isn't.


The film is obviously a farce. The presidency is a farce. There is a parallel.


It's not about either of those.

I definitely don't think the film is a farce. A farce would have been great; hell, any clear filmmaking decisions on Stone's part would have been fine. Some sequences veer toward farce before leading to something else. I don't know that anybody really decided what film they were doing. Or maybe it's just a failure of nerve.

W is an unfocused, flat, and frankly boring picture. Weiser's script is a marvel in its lack of screenwriting imagination; we get a collection of unexciting 'greatest hits' like pretzel choking, scenes of W. looking for Poppy's approval (the only scenes that work...not because of the writing, which is trite, but because Brolin and Cromwell give the only exciting performances in the movie), and back-room debates with all the dialogue taken straight from your cable dial.

Stone is hit-or-miss, but at least he never made a visually uninteresting movie. Until now.

And, yes, Thandie Newton's work here does indeed enter the list of all-time bad performances. But at least she made me laugh.

Andy, where have you been lately???

I don't think the film is focused or smart enough to work as a farce. You've got bits like the press conference near the end and Newton's performance which are clearly meant to work as comedy, but even those are tempered by an edge of seriousness and solemnity. Bush is represented as a clown, but a sort of tragic hero clown, where he's a moron but "it's not his fault" that he's in over his head.

Basically, Stone wants to have his cake and eat it too. He wants to mock Bush, but he wants to do it in a way that makes you feel sorry for the man. It doesn't work. The film doesn't work.

It's a mess. A fascinating, can't-look-away mess, but a mess nonetheless.

I read a pretty good interpretation on AD that the side characters and world are seen through Bush's eyes, which would explain a lot of the odd casting questions like Rumsfield being underestimated as a joke, Rice being overemphasized as the annoyance he sees her as, and Laura being a super babe. You could also say that's why Bush comes off favorably and sympathetic here, because that's how he sees himself, nobody wants to believe they were wrong, when in a sense everything really is his fault because he was too lax to really understand his job or assert his control and took things like Rumsfield at face value far too much. The press conference at the end where he can't come up with any of his mistakes fits perfectly in that sense, Bush throughout the film never has the depth to realize his own wrongs, and never takes the responsibility he should.

This could also explain why 9/11 was left out, because he blocked it out mentally... also why HW painted as such a hero for the first Gulf War, and why Jeb doesn't appear at all, W. seems to be insanely sensitive to his brother getting more attention than him. On that note though, the film still runs into the same problems, that if Bush really was oblivious to all his mistakes and we were seeing things as he does, there wouldn't be quite as many of his blatently dumb moments. But maybe by the end of the film he begins to realize his mistakes and screw-ups.

Anyways I'm not sure if this was completley Stone's intention, but it clears up some of the issues if it was.

Thandie aside, it's an A- movie.


I couldn't disagree more.


staying away from this god-awful hellhole!

I actually ended up seeing this again yesterday and enjoyed it even more, so I may bump up my grade a bit. If the second hour was as good as the first it would have probably been one of my favorite films of the year.

But yes, Newton was even worse the second time around.

It's a director's job to reign in their actors and get the performance they are looking for.

Shack posted something that seemed to hint that Newton was off the rails on set, but a director with Stone's clout is allowed to fire and hire as they please. If he was that turned off by her and she was truly impossible to direct, he needed to pull the plug on her.

I haven't seen the movie, but I think this plays in to the three aspects I've heard criticized the most; a schizophrenic tone, a limp-wrist effort from Stone, and a general feeling of rushed malaise. Stone probably never solidified a tone on set and was afraid to fire an important cast member because of the deadline crunch.

Yeah, I don't want to blame Newton entirely, since she's generally a fantastic actress. But it felt like she was in a different movie.

What trend would that be? That you still don't positively contribute to this site?

Really disappointing I honestly don't know if Stone knew what type of movie he was making. He spends far too little time on very important events in Bush's life for it to be close to a biopic. Yet he ruins any satire affect by throwing in these scenes that make W. too sympathetic. Brolin's pretty damn good as Bush, and Crommell despite odd casting does a pretty good job as 41, but they can not even come close to saving scenes that don't belong together in the same movie.

At least I'm not racking up my post count by simply trolling around the site picking fights and insulting other members. I simply contribute my thoughts and opinions on the movies I watch, and post in threads I think pertain to me. I also have a life outside of this site. So if I'm not posting as much as you, then maybe you should explore some other interests

YAY! Bradley is back!

On a less important topic, W. was a completely ok movie. Nothing really great about it, but it was interesting to see how they set up Bush's character. Solid B

Such a jumbled mess editing wise, and there really is no point to the film. That said the cinematography and acting is phenomenal (Thandee Newton was weird though)

A for that, but story is so unfocused and pointless at times (The Pretzel scene was put in for what?) D for that.

Overall C-, but I hope this gets some acting oscars.