MovieMantz Review: “W.”

“Executive Indecision”

“W.”
Josh Brolin, Jeffrey Wright, James Cromwell
Directed by Oliver Stone

For better or worse, Oliver Stone’s “W.” is full of surprises — some good, and some not-so-good.

For a $30 million production that just started filming in April in an effort to meet its October 17 release date (which falls less than 2 1/2 weeks before the real W’s heir-apparent is voted into the White House), the results are pretty solid, polished and entertaining. And coming from a controversial filmmaker who’s known for leaning to the left, it’s a relatively balanced and sympathetic take on a politician whose flag is firmly planted to the right.

That means frustrated moviegoers who are sick of the Iraq War, the crumbling economy and, well, just about everything else over the past eight years better look elsewhere if they’re looking for an easy target. If anything, “W.” plays it safe — perhaps too safe — and that’s the biggest surprise of all coming from the director of hot-button films like “Platoon,” “JFK” and “Natural Born Killers.”

But “W.” has its moments, particularly when power-hungry members of the Bush Administration meet behind closed doors to justify the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Otherwise, the screenplay (written by Stanley Weiser, who co-wrote “Wall Street” with Stone) covers too much ground and glosses over historical moments like the 2000 election and 9/11. It’s also full of stereotypes that depict the younger Bush as a victim who struggled to win the approval of his hard-to-please father.

So how did an insecure guy like this get to be the 43rd President of the United States anyway? Stone tries to answer that question with flashbacks to his formative years while setting events of the “present day” against the backdrop of the ill-advised Iraq War. Bush was a hard-drinking party animal at Yale, which soon led to his short career as a Texas oilman, the owner of the Rangers baseball team and, eventually, the Governor of the Lone Star State.

But when his father, President George H.W. Bush (James Cromwell), refused to invade Iraq after the liberation of Kuwait during the first Gulf War, Bush Junior opened a can of worms (and then some) by trying to finish the job during his own presidency. It didn’t matter that his second-in-command, Vice-President Dick Cheney (Richard Dreyfuss), had no exit strategy, nor was Bush given the right information by the likes of Donald Rumsfeld (Scott Glenn) and Karl Rove (Toby Jones) to justify the war to begin with. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg in a film that covers one of the most polarizing public figures in American history.

It would have been easy to portray Bush as a one-dimensional buffoon, but Josh Brolin — on something of a roll after last year’s “American Gangster” and “No Country for Old Men” — gives him considerable depth with a dynamic performance that’s equally charming, commanding and clueless. Jeffrey Wright is also terrific as the levelheaded Colin Powell, while Richard Dreyfuss and James Cromwell give strong turns as Cheney and the elder Bush respectively. But without question, the weak link here is Condi Rice, imitated here by Thandie Newton like she was in a skit from “Saturday Night Live.”

Obviously, the timing is perfect for “W.” because of the impending election, but at the same time, it’s lousy because the story isn’t finished yet. Bush is still in office, so it will be some time before the impact of his legacy can be fully determined — and that’s why the film lacks the historical perspective it needs to realize its full potential.

“W.” would have been a great movie if Stone waited another 10 years to make it, but for right now, it’s just good enough.

VERDICT: SEE IT!