Le monde selon Bush (2004) (TV)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

William Karel

Writers:

William Karel (writer)
Eric Laurent (book)

Release Date:

27 May 2004 (Belgium)

Genre:

Documentary | War

Plot:

The 1000 days of George W. Bush's presidency from the 9/11 attacks to the iraqi quagmire. How a bunch of people influenced by neo-cons hawks took control of the US foreign policy.

Plot Keywords:

George W. Bush | Iraq | Afghanistan | Iraq War | Post September 11 2001

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

John Ashcroft	...	Himself (archive footage)
Robert Baer	...	Himself
Tony Blair	...	Himself (archive footage)
Anthony Blinken	...	Himself
Hans Blix	...	Himself
William Boykin	...	Himself (archive footage)
George Bush	...	Himself (archive footage)
George W. Bush	...	Himself (archive footage)
Laura Bush	...	Herself (archive footage)
Robert Byrd	...	Himself (archive footage)
Frank Carlucci	...	Himself
Dick Cheney	...	Himself (archive footage)
David Corn	...	Himself
Arnaud de Borchgrave	...	Himself
Viêt Dinh	...	Himself
David Frum	...	Himself
Sam Gwynne	...	Himself
Jim Hoagland	...	Himself
Stanley Hoffmann	...	Himself
Saddam Hussein	...	Himself (archive footage)
Hamid Karzai	...	Himself (archive footage)
David Kay	...	Himself
Matt Lauer	...	Himself (archive footage)
Michael Ledeen	...	Himself
Charles Lewis	...	Himself
Norman Mailer	...	Himself
Ed McAteer	...	Himself
Laurent Murawiec	...	Himself
William Odom	...	Himself
Javier Pérez de Cuéllar	...	Himself
Richard Perle	...	Himself
Colin Powell	...	Himself
James Robison	...	Himself
Donald Rumsfeld	...	Himself (archive footage)
Robert Steele	...	Himself
George Tenet	...	Himself (archive footage)
Joseph Trento	...	Himself
Joseph Wilson	...	Himself
Paul Wolfowitz	...	Himself (archive footage)
James Woolsey	...	Himself

Also Known As:

The World According to Bush (International: English title) (USA)
Pourquoi Bush ne sera pas réélu en 2004 (France) (working title)

Runtime:

90 min

Country:

France | Belgium | Switzerland

Language:

English | French

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Switzerland:10 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:10 (canton of Vaud)

Filming Locations:

France

Company:

Flach Film

Trivia:

The Cannes Film Festival organizers were keen to include this movie in the Official Selection but dismissed it when Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004) by Michael Moore was selected.

Quotes:

[first lines]
George W. Bush: To those of you who received honors, awards, and distinctions, I say, well done. And to the C students, I say, you, too, can be President of the United States.
Norman Mailer: We have the worst President in America's history. He's ignorant, he's arrogant, he's stupid in all ways but one: which is that he's immensely shrewd about the American people, particularly the less intelligent half of America. Because they're very happy with him in that they realize how stupid he is, and they say to themselves, "Wonderful! If that stupid guy can be President, so can I."
[...]

Soundtrack:

Self-evident

Typical Propaganda

This film has some merit. It includes videotaped quotes from several major players in the Bush administration. Where it falls down is in it's editing. Anytime a neocon is depicted on screen you can hear the dissonant violins playing in the background and the scene is immediately cut to some unknown ex-government staffer decrying the statements as neo-nazi rather than neo-con (or any other modern political philosophy).

If the US has decided that WMDs are unacceptable in a world of global Islamic terrorism, that should be debated on those merits. Instead, this film conflates 9/11 and Iraq in a manner that is worse than anything that the "power players" in the US have done, and goes forth to insinuate that they are war mongers trying to bring about the 2nd coming of Christ, at the behest of the Jews.

These major faults degrade the usefulness of the film to "junk propaganda" status that does nothing to further the political goals of either side, and removes it from the realm of documentary. With proper editing, this could have been a good film, but the blinders were tied a too snug.