August
20, 2004 | Despite the sporadic box-office success of IMAX spectacles
and rock-concert extravaganzas, documentaries almost never attract mainstream
moviegoers. Indeed, even art-house devotees tend to respond to nonfiction
fare with all the enthusiasm displayed by Superman when he encounters
Kryptonite.
In recent months,
however, an abnormally large segment of the moviegoing public has been
drawn to politically-themed documentary features. Why? Well, perhaps
the phenomenon can be attributed to a unique concurrence: Good films
and great timing. This is, after all, the first presidential-election
year in the wake of 9/11. During a time of such widespread anxiety and
uncertainty, it's not altogether surprising that many people - including,
no doubt, many undecided voters -- are unusually venturesome in their
search for insights and answers. What is surprising is that, for many
folks, that search is leading them to movie theaters, where they are
sampling such acclaimed documentaries as Fahrenheit 9/11, Control Room
(Jehane Noujaim's fascinating inside look at al-Jazeera, the Arab satellite
news network) and, most recently, Bush's Brain.
By turns darkly
comical, seriously scary and purposefully incendiary, Bush's Brain
may appear to be, depending on your politics, either a shamelessly
one-sided assault on a steadfast U.S. President, or a justifiably harsh
critique of a politician who personifies the Peter Principle. Ultimately,
however, the movie emerges as less a report on President George W. Bush
than a study of the Commander in Chief's key strategist: Karl Rove,
the savvy and savagely competitive politico who's often accused of viewing
elections as full-contact sports.
Working from Bush's
Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential, the best-selling
book by investigative reporters James C. Moore and Wayne Slater, co-directors
Michael Paradies Shoob and Joseph Mealey have produced a frankly damning
profile of a man who apparently will stop at nothing to advance his
clients' campaigns and, of course, his own career.
Bush's Brain charts Rove's rise from his salad days as a Young Republican campus
firebrand, through his apprenticeship to political tacticians (including
the legendarily ruthless Lee Atwater), to his successful crafting of
gubernatorial and presidential campaigns for George Bush. Along the
way, Shoob and Mealey argue, Rove developed what presidential scholar
Bruce Buchanan describes as a "junkyard dog approach to politics."
According to the
filmmakers, Rove initially evidenced his talent for dirty tricks during
his high school years, when the "classic nerd" (as he's described
by an unadmiring witness) pulled mental fake-outs on opponents in debate
tournaments. Subsequently, Bush's Brain claims, Rove upped the
ante with even more duplicitous stunts in 1986, when he may have manufactured
a scandal to aid Bill Clements in the Texas gubernatorial race, and
during the 2000 Republican primaries, when he allegedly helped "independent"
activists launch an egregiously nasty smear campaign against Sen. John
McCain. (Pro-Bush hate-mongers spread the lie that the daughter McCain
and his wife adopted from Mother Teresa's orphanage - yes, you read
that correctly - was in reality McCain's black "love child.")
Since 2001, Rove has worked inside the White House - in Hillary Clinton's
former office, no less - to advance Bush in particular and the Republican
cause in general.
Shoob and Mealey
try to pre-empt any criticism about lack of balance by announcing that
Rove declined their request for on-camera interviews. Still, even certifiable
Bush-haters may be unsettled by the movie's proclivity for overkill.
There's an extended segment near the end that offers a heart-tugging
account of a U.S. solider who was killed in Iraq. Trouble is, the sequence
really adds nothing to the case against Rove, and comes off as shameless
emotional manipulation. On the other hand, Bush's Brain mounts
a fairly persuasive case to support reports that Rove loomed large in
the notorious outing of Valerie Plame as a CIA operative after her husband,
veteran diplomat Joseph Wilson, wrote a New York Timers op-ed piece
that disputed claims made by the Bush administration to justify the
invasion of Iraq.
All of which makes
you wonder what Rove may be doing now, behind the scenes, as Election
Day approaches.