Is America Ready for the Death of a President?

Director Gabriel Range creates a fictional documentary about the assassination of President George W. Bush and its aftermath to examine the United States’ reaction to 9/11.  While many will be turned off solely by the notion that the film shows the assassination of a sitting President, it is the magnitude and horror of just such an event that unfortunately makes it the perfect metaphor.  The death of a fictional President would not have had the same impact. 

In 2007, President Bush is making a speech in Chicago while a great many angry protestors march in the streets.  On his way back to the motorcade, he is shot.  The Secret Service rushes Bush to the hospital, but doctors can’t save him.  Dick Cheney is sworn in as the 44th President. 

Hundreds of people who were in the area are rounded up and questioned.  When word gets out that the main suspect is Jamal Zikri, a Muslim from Syria, the idea that this was a state-sponsored attack surfaces, a believable theory due to their involvement in the assassination of the Prime Minister of Lebanon.  Cheney wants to attack Syria and gets Congress to sign off on Patriot Act III, another expansion of executive branch powers that would give investigators more authority regarding detention and surveillance.  As Zikri’s trial moves forward, there is a lot of circumstantial evidence that implicates him, but nothing conclusive.  With so much riding on his conviction, can justice fairly be served?




Death of A President is put together extremely well, but the film’s message will be overshadowed by its medium.  The subject matter is so volatile and offensive that many won’t give the film a chance.  It is not anti-Bush and the assassination is not glorified or condoned.  In fact, the message is the complete opposite.  The assassination is a very bad thing.  The film speaks out against using violence and fear as tactics by showing the potential dangers involved.  The story has a surprising yet believable resolution.