More4 risks US ire with Bush assassination film

More4 risks US ire with Bush assassination film

Jason Deans, broadcast editor
Thursday August 31, 2006
MediaGuardian.co.uk

Death of a President: fictional documentary looking back at the assassination of Mr Bush in October 2007

Digital channel More4 will court controversy once again this autumn with a fictional piece, shot as a documentary, about the assassination of the US president, George Bush.
Death of a President seems certain to cause a furore on the other side of the Atlantic when it is premiered at the Toronto film festival next month.

In the UK the 90-minute film will be broadcast first on Channel 4's digital service in October.

The drama takes the form of a fictional documentary looking back at the assassination of Mr Bush in October 2007, after he has delivered a speech to business leaders in Chicago.

When Mr Bush arrives in the city he is confronted by a massive demonstration against the Iraq war and is gunned down by a sniper as he leaves the venue. The hunt for Mr Bush's killer focuses on a Syrian-born man, Jamal Abu Zikri.
(snip/...)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1862148,00.html

What is the point of this film? Sounds like a bad rehash of the Manchurian Candidate. Why don't they make good movies anymore?

if they'd been able to make an effective and compelling movie with a fictional president. Slapping Bush's name on it reduces the movie to a cheap way to grab headlines and make a fast buck.

:headbang:
rocknation

Last week the evil Beeb cut a spoof item about Blair's assassination from Armando Iannucci's Time Trumpet.

Uncut clip here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csF86l0AVu0
& what the BBC aired: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPRhTJ6PMhU

- hopefully More4 will hold firm. Could be interesting, could be shite, but I don't know why speculative fiction always has to be about the bad guys.

(& also, I don't know it it's been made yet, but More4 also commissioned a drama based on the idea of Blair going on holiday and being arrested for war crimes over Iraq.)

If it went through his head, he wouldn't notice :evilgrin:

out of her dress than Jackie did. No unsightly brain matter stains.

a lot of our stuff finally finds its way through to this site : http://www.thedossier.ukonline.co.uk/video_iraqwar.htm

Kepp a note of it and plough through all of the different sections in the left hand menu. There's enough there already to keep you going for weeks ! :)

I'm guessing that the original will only be shown your side if one of your channels buys it.

I wanna see how they did it.

at the Toronto Film Festival , given some publicity , might help stir things up a bit over your side. Thanks for posting this subject - I'll watch it in October.

1-Bush* is paranoid as it is (things can only get worst for him and for us)

2-Why give Darth Vader or the terrorist any ideas!

It looks like darker clouds up ahead...Not a good thing!

Progressive folks would do well to steer clear of this kind of stuff.

A snuff film is where someone is actually killed. This is a piece of fiction. It's not real. Are you making an obscure reference to the earlier "ban violent porn" thread?

films where deaths are depicted to elicit an pleasurable response.

As the article says, the film makers made a earlier film The Day Britain Stopped, about how a mid-air collision could happen, and what effects it would have. That doesn't mean they were trying to give pleasure with that scenario. There's no reason to think they are suggesting the assassination would be a good thing.

1) Ding, dong the witch is dead; or

2) Bush is just the figurehead of a sinister Neocon movement (who probably wound up responsible for his assassination).

Doesn't sound like a must-see in any event.

Given that the article says nothing of the kind. Are you just limiting it to what your own amateur scriptwriter imagaination has come up with?

Why not look at what we know:



So where do your 2 scenarios come from? A little bit more from another source:



"National paranoia" is hardly "the witch is dead"; and "the truth may lie closer to home" does not mean "he was assassinated by neocons". Yet you seem to have decided the plot already.

Would that also make The Wizard of Oz a snuff film by your definition?

You can BET it would be shown over here. You couldn't get AWAY from it. DVD's would be handed out in the Babdiss churches and there would be a video game version of it inside of two weeks.

I notice we are all being very circumspect with our comments regarding bu$h as the subject of such a film. Good Morning, Agent Mike. Do you love Irony the way we all do?

:freak:
dbt
Remember New Orleans

:kick:

here would be appalled and the Freepers would be cheering when Clinton got shot in the film.

I urge folks to be better than the Freepi.

Clinton's better than Bush.

I know that's not your main point. But I like it anyway.

Jesus. I imagine there is a plot to the story. I can understand why the freepers harp on the assasination part of the film because there is likely political concepts in the film that they don't want to be explored in a film before an election. What's your excuse?

oh wait, that "film" already played here on all the networks.

:eyes:

Have a look at this: http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23365246-details/President%20Bush%20'assassinated'%20in%20new%20TV%20docudrama/article.do?expand=true#StartComments

Pretty provocative, no?

eom

to put up an answer that will surely be deleted....

An impeachment, on the other hand, would be justice.

They would make him out to be some present-day JFK -- and that he is not! I want him to live a long, healthy life, with all his faculties intact (such as they are) -- long enough to see historians calling him "the man who tried to destroy America", and schoolchildren pointing and laughing. Maybe he'd undergo a genuine transformation and try to fix the damage he's done -- or more likely, become a hermit rather than face the constant public criticism and ridicule.

Orson Scott Card: "A Cross-Country Trip to Kill Richard Nixon"

It's a fun but finally somewhat sad tale.

It would certainly not be a happy day if this little prick died in office. Keep him at the top of the NeoCon compost pile as Iraq goes down the toilet, along with the turd's approval ratings.

it's the people who voted for them.

People are pretty ticked off; I'm loving it.

see here from earlier today : http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2486629

Just to let you know.

Just not far enough back in time. Oh, well . . .

from the subject wording. I can see it has been moved now anyway.

Still good of you to post it anyway :toast:

It worked wonders for Reagan.

Then again, Rove could have a "Machiavelli exit" planned for the Frat Boy. Maybe Bush is looking forward to hoisting a mai tai on the beach with Kenny Boy at the "Dead" Fascist Frat Boy resort.

One thing I'm sure of - Rove has at least considered both ideas.

mind...will incite even more polarization.

for the Curse of Tecumseh.

Beginning in 1840, and in each consecutive twenty-year presidential administration through 1960, the incumbent President has died in office.

1840 - William Henry Harrison......pneumonia
1860 - Abraham Lincoln......assassination
1880 - James Garfield......assassination
1900 - William McKinley.......assassination
1920 - Warren Harding........heart failure
1940 - Franklin Roosevelt.......cerebral hemorrhage
1960 - John Kennedy.....assassinated

1980 - President Reagan...Although he did not die in office, he was shot and nearly killed by an assassin.
The President was also diagnosed by some as having developed Alzheimer's disease while in office.

2000???

That might help him dodge "the curse".

By the way, I was interested in the flip side of the prediction (always good to check this sort of thing) -- how many presidents died in office who were NOT elected in years ending with "0"?

Just one, it turns out -- Zachary Taylor (elected 1848), who died of natural causes.

http://www.snopes.com/history/american/curse.asp



And as for Reagan ... I looked at the list of those who survived assassination attempts -- including the time when Andrew Jackson used his cane to beat someone who tried to shoot him at close range (!).

Although there were a number of close calls, and situations where other people nearby were killed or injured (e.g. the mayor of Chicago during FDR's presidency), I could only find one other situation, besides Reagan, where a president was actually hit but survived. And that was Teddy Roosevelt, after he had left office.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Presidential_assassination_attempts

When Bush leaves office alive in 2009, will you promise to quit repeating campfire ghost stories as if they were fact?

It's nothing more then a statisical fluke.

The world would be better if Unka dickie, aka Sneer, weren't around to ruin it.

why not a returning iraq vet who gets screwed by the govt, or the father of a soldier who's killed in iraq for no good reason?

or katherine harris, after they hang her out to dry? or a family member of someone who died on 9/11, which the govt had plenty of time and warning to prevent?

what about one of the thousands of people bush has bullied in his lifetime?

the list of people who'd have reason to shoot bush is long. it certainly doesn't have to be a middle easterner.

You can guess where that leads . . .

If he was assasinated, I would believe that the neocons did it in order to make another 9/11-style event happen and reap the political rewards while at the same time forestalling any further investigation into BushCo affairs AND preserving the legacy of Bush. By making him a martyr future neocon politicians will be able to tearfully embrace the policies of our "slain president, cut down in the prime of life".

Is this too cynical?

at all times.

cheney would profit immensely if something happened to bush. the little prince has been nothing but a tool and puppet throughout his "career." so when the times comes that his death and martyrdom is worth more to his backers than his being alive, look for a bullet through the head.

they might try a trip over the handlebars of his bike or a killer pretzel, but they need to claim it's the work of a nefarious middle easterner so they can invade whichever country's next on the checklist.

But glad to see I'm not the only cynic out there...

deleted messages. LOL

because I figured it would trigger a knock on the door by Agent Mike and a fast trip to a tropical locale. The bottom line is that even though a good half of Americans can't stand the guy, few wish him dead. Personally, I just want him back in Texas.

Insert your own joke here :-)

attention on this kind of thing.

and as much as I appreciate artistic freedom ...

I think this is tasteless and utterly undesirable .... I believe in the rule of law in a liberal society, and this kind of vicarious depiction of violence is no better than any other depictions of violence ....

We dont need misplaced expressions of sympathy to arise for the Asshole In Chief .... We want people to keep their eyes on what is REALLY happening, and not some pretend event .... The way to remove this party from power is to have the people EJECT them at the ballot box .... NOT by killing them, but by voting them out ....

The issue of fair voting practices is another question, and doesnt provide cover for tasteless fictions ....