'Chicks' flick, Bush assassination tale offer prelude to midterm polls

LOS ANGELES (AP) - President George W. Bush is getting another big-screen close-up.

Two films touching on Bush open the same day, one about a country trio ashamed the president's from their home state, the other chronicling his fictional assassination. As Michael Moore's Bush-bashing hit "Fahrenheit 9/11" showed two years ago, politically charged films are not likely to affect elections. But "Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing" and "Death of a President," both debuting Friday, are positioned as talking points for the congressional elections 10 days later.

"Films don't influence elections. People have to," said Barbara Kopple, who directed "Shut Up and Sing" with Cecilia Peck. "If there's something they see in a particular film, maybe they'll explore it further. If it hits at just the right spot, they may go out and help to change something."

"Shut Up and Sing" recounts the fallout after Dixie Chicks singer Natalie Maines told a London concert crowd in 2003 that she and band mates Martie Maguire and Emily Robison were ashamed that Bush is from Texas, the remark coming on the eve of the U.S. war in Iraq.

Conservative commentators condemned them, country radio stations banned their songs and fans boycotted their records.

"Death of a President" is a fictional film presented as a documentary examining the assassination of Bush after an economic speech in Chicago on Oct. 19, 2007.

Bush is gunned down by a sniper, the film centering on the chaotic months that follow as conspiracy theories arise, questions emerge about the government's key suspect and Dick Cheney, sworn in as president, pushes through an expansion of the Patriot Act to broaden federal powers of surveillance.

The two films are the latest critiquing Bush and his administration's policies amid the war on terrorism.

Among them are two released on DVD right before the elections: "The Road to Guantanamo," examining the plight of British Muslims being held without charges for two years at the U.S. military prison in Cuba, and the satire "American Dreamz" starring Dennis Quaid as a Bush-like president targeted for assassination during an appearance as a guest judge on an "American Idol"-style talent show.

Gabriel Range, the British director and co-writer of "Death of a President," said the fictional assassination was a plot device to examine world affairs since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"The intention was not to upset people, but I think there are times films should be provocative, they should be outrageous. I think the provocation in this case is entirely justified," Range said. "Whenever there is a national tragedy of any kind, any horrific event, there's always a period of reflection. Imagining the assassination of President Bush was a very potent and striking way of looking at where we've gotten in the last five years."

Mixing archival footage, dramatized sequences and fictionalized interview segments, the film mainly deals with the consequences of the assassination, how it traumatizes America and further provokes a post-Sept. 11 siege mentality.

"Some people imagined this film would be something other than what it is. They imagined a kind of sick version of 'Fahrenheit 9/11' in which there would be kind of a bloodletting," Range said.

"Anyone who buys their movie ticket to get some sort of thrill out of this I think will be disappointed. Anyone expecting the film to in any way celebrate this act I think really will be in for a shock. It's clearly portrayed as what it would be. A terrible, terrible thing for America."

Newmarket Films, which distributed Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ," acquired "Death of a President" after its premiere at September's Toronto International Film Festival. Some cinema chains have rejected the film, but Newmarket plans to debut it in most major U.S. markets. It's unusual for a festival acquisition to hit theaters so quickly, though Newmarket head of distribution Richard Abramowitz said the fast turnaround had nothing to do with the Nov. 7 election.

"I can categorically say without hesitation that that wasn't in anyone's mind when we sat at the table to evaluate the release schedule," Abramowitz said.

Abramowitz said Newmarket wanted to capitalize on the buzz the film received in Toronto. Range added that the filmmakers wanted it in theaters as quickly as possible after it aired in early October on British television.

"Shut Up and Sing" follows the Dixie Chicks' travails in the three years since Maines uttered what she felt was a mild slam against Bush.

"We were proud of her and surprised at the swiftness of the backlash against her, and we understood something had happened that reflected the state of freedom of speech in our country," director Peck said. "It galvanized us to want to go and make the film."

One protester in the film suggests Maines should be strapped to a bomb and dropped on Baghdad. Others tote signs depicting Maines with an X over her mouth.

The trio went from darlings to pariahs of country music but responded with defiance and a healthy dose of humor. The documentary has footage of their Entertainment Weekly photo shoot in which their bare bodies are covered with such slogans as "Saddam's Angels" and "Dixie Sluts."

The uproar reflects the hard line the Bush administration has taken since Sept. 11, in which dissent is branded unpatriotic, said Kopple, a two-time Academy Award winner for the documentaries "Harlan County, U.S.A." and "American Dream."

"I think there has been no president that has disgraced this country more," Kopple said. "As Americans, it's difficult to go anywhere without people feeling a tremendous amount of anger. I think his policies are not policies that a good deal of the American people believe in. It just seems like there's a cowboy mentality, dead or alive, you're either with us or against us.

"No longer is there a dialogue or discussion. We need more than ever to have people stand up and speak out their opinions."