10.27.08: culture blotter {W.}

does anyone remember what life was like before this election season (back in, what, 2006)? i shudder to think of what might rush into the media vacuum created when it's over and i stop gulping down coverage for hours every night (and bouncing around political sites for hours on top of that). there's nothing inherently wrong with following this stuff, of course, but the feedback loop gets intense (especially when i get absorbed in my current stealth craft project and don't realize i've been stuck on MSNBC for a few hours: at the end of last week, when rachel maddow sat down to talk about keith olbermann and chris matthews's coverage of brian williams's comments after his mccain/palin interview, my head nearly exploded).

so we detoxed this weekend with W., which is about totally different elections. note: the weekend before the weekend before a national election is not the best time to roll up to a theater on the upper west side sans advance tickets for an oliver stone movie. the 2:50 show sold out years before we got there, so we had to dash through the rain to times square, where liberals of a a certain age fear to tread (and a bunch of guys sitting behind us nearly got into a seat-kicking-related fistfight). the popcorn was terrible, but the movie was entertaining. josh brolin is reasonable in the title role, although he's a bit larger and more dapper than i think he should be: the real dubya is kind of chimpy, and i've never been sold on the manly-man, texas cowboy vibe he's supposed to emit. i feel a bit sorry for this fictional dubya; he's stupid and charming enough that i have a hard time blaming him for the terrible things his minions have done to our country. elizabeth banks as (parker posey as) laura is equally winning: she obviously loves her husband, and his scenes with her feel much more authentic than (most of) his scenes as commander in chief do. a brief guide to other key players:

ellen burstyn (barbara bush): formidable.

james cromwell (bush senior): not a lookalike, but effective as a chilly father figure.

richard dreyfuss (dick cheney): will get a best supporting actor nod. really, really great.

toby jones (karl rove): good, but an evil lawn gnome; the real rove is an evil baby, as we all know.

thandie newton (condoleezza rice): should've settled for looking like condi. her one-note impression stole and destroyed all of her scenes.

jeffrey wright (colin powell): should've tutored thandie newton; looked and sounded nothing like powell, nailed the character anyway.

joe appreciated how the camera followed a character as she stepped on a corncob just before introducing laura to george at a backyard barbecue; i loved it when barney hopped into the presidential bed to steal bush's warm spot (joe has similar problems). those little moments of "authenticity" kept the movie from sinking under the weight of its umpteen Bush Moments. i appreciate stone's research, to be sure, but every time a well-known phrase rolled out of brolin, we were forced to remember that we were Watching a Movie About Our Crappy President (meta phooey). i preferred forgetting that i hate bush, though i hate myself for the preference. does that make sense?

how are you counting down, internets? how are you holding up?

Labels: movies, politics