(Contains Spoilers)
Feted upon release for its controversial content, Death of a President looks into the realm of possibility if George W. Bush were to be assassinated. Given how contentious the President’s policies have been both at home and abroad, it’s not a difficult leap to make. On the eve of a speech in downtown Chicago, Bush’s motorcade is met with fierce opposition as thousands of barely controlled protestors take to the streets to vent their fury at his stance on the war in Iraq. Director Gabriel Range accurately conveys the mob mentality and the claustrophobia – as well as the simmering hatred – within the protests. It’s no spoiler to reveal the President ends up dying, but the rest of the film concerns itself with the after effects – and how quickly the assassination becomes a focal point for change in Government policy both at home and abroad.

Though somewhat clichéd in treatment – the secret service agents/various talking heads show a degree of hammy acting – the fact that Bush’s death urges civil liberties to be ignored, justifies a more intrusive version of the Patriot Act, and incites ethnic racism and general paranoia, seems all too real. Interviews with those investigating the assassination expose prejudices through the practice of pooling suspects with Islamic-sounding names, while the media is shown to jump on the bandwagon in the hunt for a suspect, quick to label them the Al Qaeda assassin. Vice President Dick Cheney is sworn in after assassination – and his first move is to tie the assassin to Syria and use the link as an excuse for an incursion there. These are clumsy stereotypes that unfortunately ring true, but nevertheless jar the overall feel of what is a slick faux-documentary which ticks all the right boxes for realism. A clever mix of digitally edited footage gets Mr Bush in the thick of the action to start with, but as the opening shot explains, there was no co-operation from the White House or the Secret Service – something which raised a titter from the audience.

The end of the film is in hindsight predictable, with the shooter discovered to be an American whose son died in the Iraq conflict – not the ‘Islamic’ suspect whose liberties were run roughshod, tried on the flimsiest of forensic evidence, and convicted on the basis of media speculation and that he’d once been to Afghanistan and attended the “wrong kind of summer camp”. What’s disconcerting about Death of a President is that while the clichés are rolled out, you can’t help but feel that given the times we now live in, it’s really a very accurate – and in places terrifying – foreshadowing of how such an event would impact American life as we continue to live in a post-9/11 world.—Darren Bevan