Death of a President

DIRECTOR: Gabriel Range

Everyone loves to hate President George W Bush, and he surely has many baying for his blood. But what exactly would happen if someone put a bullet through Bush, in the heart of America?

This remarkable “mockumentary”, on events post a Bush assassination, examines such a situation. Without taking sides and managing to steer clear of an anti-war or Bush-bashing agenda, it presents an authentic portrayal of a bruised administration handling one of its worst crises post-9/11, in the backdrop of all that followed that cataclysmic attack.

Perhaps it helps that this is a British-made film. While that doesn’t seem to have done it any good in the US — where several big theatre chains refused to show it — the film actually does a favour to the President by hinting that though he may be wrong, his actions are guided by the strong belief that he is doing what is best for the country.

Shot as an investigative documentary for TV, it has interviewers talking to all the parties to the incident — officials in the Bush administration, the Secret Service, the FBI, the forensics experts, and the suspect’s family.

Director Gabriel Range, who also co-wrote the film, brings out the dilemma of the investigators as nicely. Painted as villains for their massive crackdown post-9/11, they tread gingerly but inevitably down the same path here — a suspect with a Muslim name, Syrian descent and a Pakistan stamp on his passport is caught, convicted and sentenced within seven months.

As an investigator says, the pressure to produce results is too high and the credentials of such a suspect too juicy to pass over.

However, the end is a cop-out. It seems like, at the last minute, Range decided to dress up the film with an anti-war message. The twist is unconvincing, and the only timid note in a brave and honest effort.