Oliver Stone's, "W."

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I personally thought he was great as Bush, now I can't say for sure someone may or may not have done a better job but it's a stretch to start calling out any names.

I'm always annoyed when people dislike a movie because of what they expected. I like to look at a film under the terms of what the filmmakers were going for, not what I may have imagined or would rather see.

Overall I thought the movie was good and enjoyed seeing it a a lot. I never thought it dragged on or was boring, which is probably due to the intercutting of different time periods, and the performances stand on their own, no explanation needed. The fact that the movie wasn't left or right wing was interesting to see too, considering how prolifically Stone has treated issues in the past.

I'll need to see it again before I can form a full opinion on where it stands.

CallaghanFilms said:
If that were the case, why weren't ANY of the principle parties contacted?
Obviously, a President (as the most powerful man in the world) can't lend himself to any sort of bio.
But how about Ari Fleischer? He said that he was not contacted once.
No one depicted in W was in fact. Doesn't sound very even-handed to me.
No, instead what Stone has made a tradition of doing (for several biopics now) is to take bits
from various (un-authorized) biographies, piece them together, then call it "public domain".
That way he never has to pay for any rights.
Hey, that's his MO. If he can get away with it, good ($$) for him...
But doing so to a sitting President weeks before a major election is shameful.
I don't give a damn what political party that President happens to belong to, it's shameful.
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I'm not sure I get this dude, why would Stone need to contact the real people to make an even-handed movie? Perhaps W. isn't even-handed, Ill have to watch it again to make sure because there were times when Bush's speaking ability and credibility as a president came into question. Stone wasn't going for a historical drama piece and I don't see any reason why he would should have contact real people. Especially when I think about the scenes/events of the film I just don't think it would have added anything.

The thing about doing a picture about a sitting President before a major election (which the current President isn't even a part of) being shameful is also something I don't understand. I think it's liberating that nowadays we have the freedom to make such projects when we want to and especially make them when they are pertinent to today and now. Shameful is a pretty strong word, its not like he was glorifying suicide terrorists or making fun of the tragedy of the World Trade Center attacks, that may be shameful. But otherwise, off the top of my head I can't think of a single film thats shameful, but maybe I'm not thinking hard enough.
 
I think that Oliver Stone has become a hack director, and I wonder suddenly if he always was. Must rewatch JFK soon. Because there's some good material here, but I felt like it was really one-note and really poorly directed.

I did actually find that W. (the character) was really likeable when he wasn't in a scene that made his drama seem laughable, and on that criteria alone I'd say the movie succeeds. Brolin is very good. Dreyfuss is amazing. Thandie Newton is some weird combination of excellent and laughably horrible that I can't even explain. I personally was really bothered by James Cromwell, who in sharp contrast to all of the other actors made no attempt whatsoever to imitate H.W. in any way. It felt really out of place, and I expected more from an actor I generally respect and admire. The other supporting characters are for the most part terrific... but Stone's directing is so lazy and on-the-nose that it essentially sabotages their contributions.

Ultimately the movie felt mostly like a pointless exercise to me. At times Stone seems to go to great lengths to make us empathize with George, and then he tears down all that hard work with a goofy music cue and a just-for-laughs edit.

Unfortunately I think this movie ultimately suffers from being too close to its material, and therefore too lacking in perspective. I bet the 2012 version of this movie is way more powerful and insightful than the 2008 one, but unfortunately I guess we'll never know.
 
dougspice said:
I personally was really bothered by James Cromwell, who in sharp contrast to all of the other actors made no attempt whatsoever to imitate H.W. in any way. It felt really out of place, and I expected more from an actor I generally respect and admire.
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I was more bothered by the fact that he seemed to be the same age in 1972 as he was in 2002. He didn't try at all to impersonate Bush 1, but I thought his performance was good.
 
dougspice said:
I think that Oliver Stone has become a hack director, and I wonder suddenly if he always was. Must rewatch JFK soon. Because there's some good material here, but I felt like it was really one-note and really poorly directed.
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I will certainly come to the defense of Stone's previous work. I haven't seen anything he's made post Nixon and so can't speak to that, but his '89-'95 era I find AMAZING! Born on the Fourth of July, The Doors and JFK are each examples of some superlative filmmaking (IMHO) and the fact that all three of these HUGE projects were filmed and released in a 3 YEAR PERIOD I find astounding. Add Natural Born Killer and Nixon to that era and you have what I have only recently realized is one of my absolute favorite filmmakers :) But like I said, W. didn't do it for me.

dougspice said:
Thandie Newton is some weird combination of excellent and laughably horrible that I can't even explain.
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lol agreed
 
I've always seen Oliver Stone as a director who blew his load after 1990 and has been making more crap cinema than anything, lets face it Alexander pretty much confirmed that he's just running on fumes, I cant imagine anyone spending 12 years writing a script and having it suck harder than a hole in space, then claiming the reason the film failed in America is because Americans dont have any sense of history.
 
Wrathborne said:
I've always seen Oliver Stone as a director who blew his load after 1990 and has been making more crap cinema than anything, lets face it Alexander pretty much confirmed that he's just running on fumes, I cant imagine anyone spending 12 years writing a script and having it suck harder than a hole in space, then claiming the reason the film failed in America is because Americans dont have any sense of history.
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like I said I haven't seen anything post Nixon (except for W.) so you might very well be right. But you gotta admit, if your gunna blow your wad, what a wad it was ;)
 
Alexander was terrible. And I'm not american!

Oliver Stone's best, for me, was Natural Born Killers. More and more i see him as a competend director but also as an average scriptwritter.

It would be interesting to see an Oliver Stone film penned by Kaufmman (from Eternal Sunshine of the...; Adaptation). Stone seems like he's at his best when working with the leading edge screenwriters.
 
SPZ said:
Alexander was terrible. And I'm not american!

Oliver Stone's best, for me, was Natural Born Killers. More and more i see him as a competend director but also as an average scriptwritter.

It would be interesting to see an Oliver Stone film penned by Kaufmman (from Eternal Sunshine of the...; Adaptation). Stone seems like he's at his best when working with the leading edge screenwriters.
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Sorry, but the scripts for Scarface and Midnight Express were great, although I realize that was many years ago.
 
Ok I knew I would enjoy the movie...and I did.

Did exactly what I thought, which was tell the more personal story. They took shots at him in spots as I expected, and showed a different side of things a lot more.

Here's the thing, lots of people I know don't want to go see it because they think its nothing but a punch in the face the whole movie, or they'll go see it because they think its nothing but a punch in the face the whole movie lol....one guy when it was over (along with all the others who we're there groaning at the end) said "wasn't this supposed to be a comedy?" He was joking when he said it but I knew there would be people like him. Unfortunately people are too dense to read past the marketing and see the movie for what it is.

I also enjoyed seeing less about 9/11 and more of the aftermath. The aftermath is really what angers people right now so he was smart to have included that more openly. Also it showed that Government makes mistakes, and bad ones. The war in Iraq is NOT THE FAULT OF ANY ONE MAN. There is a whole group of people responsible for the influencing of decisions, making decisions within those decisions, bad intel (which makes bad decisions), and on and on it goes. People in the theater HATED that they didn't show the War and the lack of WMD's found to be a soley Bush decision and mistake. Friggin idiots, learn about how things work.

If you want to go see this movie to see GWB shown as a sideshow clown, you got the wrong movie. His personality is "unique" lol and yes you can chuckle quite a bit at him (he EATS A LOT), but regardless of whether or not you like who he is...he's still got some guts. I guess its the doom of every president to have everyones bad choices and decisions including your own dumped on your head. But at least a film like this showed a bit of what it might be like to deal with all that pressure, decisions, etc....and what happens when those decisions are bad.

The ending shot of the baseball hit and the ball not falling was an interesting ending, I liked that.

I will throw in too that J. Brolin did an incredible job at Bush. He really hit a homer on this film...I hope he get some recognition. People we're talking about Oscar nominations and now I can understand why...phew.
 
I hope he at least gets an oscar nod. It was great performance. Like a weird hybrid of two people.

Although I do think they portray Bush as a sideshow clown. Remember the line, "Remember, Cheney, I'm the decider!"
 
I wouldn't move out of the movie itself and into the real world events. This will lead to the thread being locked pretty quickly. :)
 
Richard Dreyfuss Slams "W" movie!

When asked why he made the film, he said he did it for "money." Dreyfuss also said, "I think it's 6/8ths of a great film."
Asked how it was to work with Oliver Stone, he said "imagine working for Sean Hannity... you can be a fascist, even when you're on the left."
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OUCH!

Not trying to get the thread closed. Maybe we can focus on his comments regarding the movie and Oliver Stone.
 
Wow funny stuff about Stone, what a tard, and thanks for the decider youtube clip, it certainly does have to do with the movie and now puts that scene in another light. I wonder how much other stuff is inspired by real events that I am just not aware of.
 
Kubrick71 said:
Wow funny stuff about Stone, what a tard, and thanks for the decider youtube clip, it certainly does have to do with the movie and now puts that scene in another light. I wonder how much other stuff is inspired by real events that I am just not aware of.
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The film website has a page that references all their sources, pretty interesting--

http://wthefilm.com/guide/
 
I was like 10ft away from RD about a year ago...it kinda scared me because he looked so old and brittle. Seeing that video and the movie gave me confidence he wont die too soon lol.

Great clip by the way I had read his quotes on the film but seeing him speak about them was better :P
 
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