[h1]British film killing off Bush outrages [span style="text-decoration: line-through;"]Americans [/span]Republicans
[/h1] [cite class="byline"]Adam Sherwin[/cite] [cite class="author"][/cite] [div class="pub-date"]September 02, 2006[/div] [h4]IT is a shot that echoes around the world - President George W. Bush being assassinated by a fanatical sniper in a Chicago hotel.[/h4][p class="encompass"] At least that is the story of a "shockingly real" British Channel 4 film that is causing outrage among Americans. [/p]Death of a President uses digital trickery, archive footage and actors to imagine the murder of Mr Bush and the descent into national paranoia that follows. The feature-length drama will have its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival next month, before screening in Britain on More4, Channel 4's digital sister channel. [/p] Channel 4 hopes to sell the film to US broadcasters, but [span style="text-decoration: line-through;"]a small vocal group of Republicans[/span] Americans yesterday declared it to be tasteless and shocking. [/p] The White House refused to comment on the film, which it said "did not dignify a response". In Texas, Mr Bush's home state, a Republican Party spokeswoman said: "I find this shocking, I find it disturbing. I don't know if there are many people in America who would want to watch something like that."
[/p][span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 191);"]I promise you, honeybunch, there [span style="text-decoration: underline;"]ARE[/span]. Many, many people. Just not in your campaign office. -tb[/span][/p]A senior Republican official in Washington said: "It sounds like it's in very poor taste and in keeping with the tactics of liberal groups who have frequently tried to compare the President to Hitler and his policies to those of fascism."[/p][span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 191);"]LOL! How could anyone equate Bush and his policies with fascism?? Oh, wait...maybe making secret laws, jailing people indefinitely without arresting them, holding secret trials, opening your mail, tapping your phones, declaring dissent to be subversive....okay, I withdraw the question. -tb[/span]
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The film is set in October next year, when "US foreign and domestic policies have polarised the country's electorate". Arriving in Chicago to make a speech to business leaders, the President is confronted by a large anti-war demonstration. He continues with his visit but as he leaves he is shot dead by a sniper. The assassination scene explicitly recalls the attempt on president Ronald Reagan's life in 1981. John Hinckley fired six shots at close range as Reagan left a Washington hotel. The film is directed by Gabriel Range, who made the BBC drama The Day Britain Stopped, which imagined a chain of events that could paralyse the transport system. [/p] Range denied accusations of sensationalism. "The film is based on meticulous research and interviews with FBI agents and people on the other side of the war on terror," he said. "It's a serious, sensitive film. There is no way it would encourage anyone to assassinate Bush."[/p][span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 191);"]Yep, no way anyone could come up with that idea on their own. Impossible! -tb[/span]
[/p] Peter Dale, the head of More4, said the film combined a "gripping detective story" with a thought-provoking critique of contemporary US society. [/p] But John Beyer of Britain's TV watchdog MediaWatch, told the Daily Mirror: "There's a lot of feeling against President Bush and this may well put ideas into people's heads."[/p][span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 255);"]Yeah, cuz like no one would ever consider doing that unless they made a film about it. -tb[/span]
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