I am not quite sure how a DVD on such a subject as George W. Bush that has an obvious comic tint could be as unfunny as this little venture. I was always a believer that Bush was a dyslexic but that interestingly enough turns out to be untrue, according to the introduction in Jacob Weisberg’s now infamous book ‘Bushisms’. Anyway true or not, the guy has got some defect; maybe he is just unknowing fascist who lacks certain abilities or someone who is genuinely not that clever. What ever it is, whenever he appears on TV, some little gem, either vocally or in demeanour, escapes him and makes me grimace in a guilty half laugh. So how could a DVD using these mess ups as its core footage be so painfully unfunny. Well if you have a couple of minutes to read on I will let you know.
Firstly, the main presenter Brian Unger, who comes across as the kind of guy who should be presenting one of those ‘animals do the strangest things’ type of programmes from America. After being presented with a BUSHISM (which is Bush saying his quote, followed by a textual reiteration), Unger then tries to explain the cock up in a manner that instantly wanted me to smash the DVD into 1 piece (a Bushism). We actually get more of this clean cut United Statesian (another Bushism – are you annoyed yet?) than we do Bush himself. Unger explains the obvious, then adds another little explanation that makes you want to bury a pick axe right in the middle… I am sure you get the draft (another one – now you understand the feeling I had when watching this, and yes after 5 mins of the DVD it had started to grind).
Secondly, the structure of the DVD is so horrendous that you feel like a child entering school for the first day. In between Unger and the ‘Bushisms’ book auteur Weisberg, and Al Franklin (for his funny film moment, see the deleted scenes in the remake of THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE and have the commentary turned on) we are treated to such delights as The George W. Bush singers, who reiterate the phrases Bush has just said in the preceeding sections. Not only are these embarrassing, they are poorly filmed and again make you feel like pressing the self destruct button on your DVD players. Another little insert section is The George W. Bush dictionary that presents us with words he has created like ‘Ingrinable’, ‘misunderestimate’ and ‘subliminable’, over his short presidential career. Finally, and the last kind of structural monstrosity is the George W. Bush Theatre, which is basically Weisberg reading a quote directly from his own book, and thus giving it a free plug.
Thirdly, the secondary point above, takes up 50 minutes of this DVD’s running time, which makes it very boring, to the point of tedium.
EXTRAS
BUSHISM CLIPS (11 Mins)
These are the clips of Bush laced together one after the other and in the sequence they were in the programme. To be brutally honest, this section is full of the money shots on this DVD, and if you are in the presence of this DVD, just watch this section only, as there are some gems here. Although I don’t won’t to plug this DVD in any way, this section shows Bush, in crisp cleaned up footage, and might be quite beneficial to any film maker out there who needs an insert for a film they might be making (obviously you may need approval from somewhere but hey…). Although as a DVD extra, you can’t quite get over the fact that this is a bit of a cheat to advertise it as an extra, considering it was taken directly from the feature presentation.
THE GEORGE W. BUSH SINGERS (12 Mins)
Like the above these are the pathetic songs lifted from the feature and placed next to each other.
DICTIONARY (2 Mins)
Surprise, Surprise, these are the dictionary words, mentioned above, placed next to one another. How truly original!
BUSHISMS QUIZ
This is an interactivity part of the DVD where you have three choices of answers for quotes you have heard (yes) in the Feature. Oh yes and hidden in hear is a Bush Biography, well 300 words that feel like they have been paraphrased from Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11.
The DVD quality is high and there are English subtitles. The sound is also clear.
Anyway, I am sure you get the point now, it is very tedious (even though it puts all the money shots together in one section, so you don’t have to watch the mundane inserts). It does feel though that we are laughing at someone who does have some cognitive disability of some nature, and as I said before this does feel like a guilty laugh. There are unarguably funny lines to quote, (of which I will highlight a few of my favourites at the end of this paragraph), but apart from that I cannot see the appeal of this. It is a sad truth that in the 21st Century this moron is the most powerful figurehead alive, right at the point where the world will either self destruct naturally (did I say naturally…), or where we all be in so much fear we will need to do a turd before we go to sleep and before we get up. For anyone interested in something more satisfying I hear that Adam Curtis’s THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES (shown on BBC in a 3 part series) was shown as a documentary feature film (2hrs, 30mins) at the Cannes film festival this year (after being requested by folk like Bertrand Tavernier) and will be on release very soon around the cinemas of Europe. Interestingly I hear that it will neither be released in American cinemas or shown on TV; it was shown at the Tribecca film festival in New York and had a queue stretching to Lapland. Anyway avoid this DVD like the plague and I will give you some highlights for free, but remember it’s all in the name of fun, it’s not serious:
To the Japanese Parliament : “FOR A CENTURY AND A HALF NOW, AMERICA AND JAPAN HAVE FORMED ONE OF THE GREAT AND ENDURING ALLIANCES OF MODERN TIMES”
To the Iraqi people : “IT WILL TAKE TIME TO RESTORE CHAOS”
On the invasion of Afghanistan : “THERE IS NO DOUBT IN MY MIND WE WILL FAIL”
General quotes :
“I KNOW THE HUMAN BEING AND THE FISH CAN CO-EXIST PEACEFULLY”
“YOU’RE WORKING HARD TO PUT FOOD ON YOUR FAMILY”
“WE’LL MAKE AMERICA WHAT WE WANT IT TO BE, A LITERATE COUNTRY AND A HOPEFULLER COUNTRY”
and last but not least
“FREE NATIONS DON’T DEVELOP WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTIONS”
Thank god we only have three years or so left, who will we get next, Ronald Reagan’s goldfish, or Bill Clinton’s cigar? When I think of this Bush, I always hark back to the STOP THE WAR marches, when a rather fetching girl walked past me with a T-Shirt on that said ‘THE ONLY BUSH I TRUST IS MY OWN’ and in the words of Dubya ‘ME THREE’.