A new take on the fakeumentary, "The Death of a President"

I watched the fakeumentary last night, "The Death of a President," which portrays President George W. Bush being shot and killed. The majority of critics disliked this film, about 6 in 10. I read many of their reviews and many commoners reviews, as well.

Some commoners laid claim that this was an immoral piece of filmmaking (they hadn't seen it yet). Others stated that the writers and directors were obviously anti-American. I read one person state that it's a very weak film, for the simple fact that it contains no hard facts. Some stated that it was made for pure shock appeal, with their being no true substance underneath. Many critiqued it simply based on the fact that Bush was assassinated in the film.

I have a new take on the film after watching it. First off, it is fiction. Of course, it's not true. That's what fiction is. If it were non-fiction, that'd be another story, but it's not. It's fake. It's false. It's untrue. It's fiction. So, no, there are not going to be any hard facts produced in a fiction film. But, I think a lot of these people are missing the point. While the "shock" value is in depicting the president get assassinated, that was a very minor point in the film, as far as I'm concerned.

Perhaps I'm overanalyzing or thinking this (I do that sometimes), but President Bush's death in the film, to me at least, symbolized the attacks of 9/11 and what followed. The Patriot Act (III, in this case) was signed into permanence, which gave the president and executive branch of government even more power than before, and trampled on the civil liberties of US citizens, anti-war and peace protesters, in particular. Not much time passed before the US declared a Muslim, native of Syria, as the assassin. He was found guilty in court on very little evidence. The actual assassin's son came forward about profound evidence he found of his father's to link him to the murder, but the Syrian man remained in prison and on death row even after this fact. Then President Cheney used the incident to launch an attack on Syria, something he had wanted to do for years. Aren't there a few too many parallels to ignore? What transpired following 9/11? The signing of the first Patriot Act and all the powers it abuses. President Bush used the event to strike who was it again? Oh yeah, Iraq, considering we're still over there. This was just an overnight thing too, right? No, I don't think so. He and his administration were attempting to find any slight connection between Iraq and/or Saddam to the attacks, so they could invade. Not long following the attacks of 9/11, we immediately knew who the supposed perpetrator was, one Osama Bin Laden. Nevermind that the guy never came forward about the attacks, that fake tapes were made in his name that the CIA claimed were authentic, and the fact the man has been dead for a while now, he was clearly the mastermind of the attacks. It wouldn't even matter if the true mastermind made his/her presence known tomorrow, the name and face of Bin Laden has been implanted into the American mind to be associated with the 9/11 attacks.

For me, personally, this film didn't show me anything new, because unlike most people I know, I actually do my reading and research and don't just take the government's word for it. So, while it didn't show me anything I didn't already know, I do feel it presented the material in a clever manner, which many others could find useful, to hopefully expand their horizons and provoke them to do a little more reading and research on bills such as the Patriot Act, on racial profiling, on the fake Bin Laden tapes, on the Bush Administration's abuses of power, on the false pretenses for the war, etc. While the FICTIONAL film doesn't provide any concrete facts and didn't show me anything new, there were enough interesting real world parallels to make it a worthwhile watch.