President George W. Bush is choking on a pretzel in the White House and falls from a sofa. Saddam Hussein is there with him. Later Bush flies on a magic carpet over Baghdad as he bombs the city. Eventually Saddam returns to the White House to scream insults at him. These were actual sequences that were originally in Oliver Stone's 'W.' movie which is opening this Friday. However, since they were finally cut from the movie, Stone is now patting himself on his back for his forbearance. Even funnier than that dopey fantasy scene that Stone cut is his self-evaluation in this money quote about not taking political sides that appeared in the Chicago Sun-Times (emphasis mine):
The controversial director is feeling the heat from what certainly will be the most talked-about film of 2008, but Stone is someone who never lets them see him sweat.
Days away from his "W." opening at the multiplex, Stone is mulling over if and when the real commander-in-chief will see the biography Stone directed about his life.
"I think in this present political state, the real George W. Bush might not approve of this movie," says Stone with a wry grin. "But this movie tries to understand George W. Bush -- the good, the bad and the ugly.
"I tried to be fair and balanced and compassionate," Stone adds. "I don't take sides. I don't take political sides. I'm a dramatist, and this is the movie I've made."
Got that? The leftwing Stone doesn't take political sides despite the fact that 'W.' portrays Bush as nothing much more than a dissolute drunkard who disappoints his father as you can see in this reality challenged trailer. Here is a summary of the movie by the Sun-Times' Cindy Pearlman:
In "W.," Josh Brolin portrays the 43rd president of the United States as a beer-guzzling, hazed Yale frat guy who fails at his Daddy-pulled-the-strings jobs in the Texas oil fields, manages a baseball team in Texas and then shockingly lands at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
In between, he boozes it up, puts down the bottle, marries Laura (Elizabeth Banks), wrestles with the long shadow of his father and even finds religion at age 40. All of his White House meetings end with a quick prayer session.
...The president doesn't exactly come off like a Rhodes Scholar in the film, and his personal life isn't off limits. One scene has his daddy griping about having to deal with one of his young namesake's former girlfriends.
"What are you cut out for -- chasing tail? You're not a Kennedy. You're a Bush," fumes Cromwell.
Stone insists his film isn't a satire.
Perhaps not satire but definitely highly laughable fiction.
