Review of The American President (1995) by Leo H — 08 Jul 2008

I alwys seem to fall for these semi-political films about good presidents. And I find this one particularly charming. Micheal Douglas is okay, but Annette Bening is so perfect as a lobbyist and new girlfriend of widowed president. But most of all it is the script. Aaron Sorkn simply knows how to write snappy lines. The signature press conference comment by President Shepard is a good example, of which the following is only a portion:

"You want to claim this land as the land of the free? Then the symbol of your country can't just be a flag; the symbol also has to be one of its citizens exercising his right to burn that flag in protest. Show me that, defend that, celebrate that in your classrooms. Then, you can stand up and sing about the "land of the free". I've known Bob Rumson for years, and I've been operating under the assumption that the reason Bob devotes so much time and energy to shouting at the rain was that he simply didn't get it. Well, I was wrong. Bob's problem isn't that he doesn't get it. Bob's problem is that he can't sell it! We have serious problems to solve, and we need serious people to solve them. And whatever your particular problem is, I promise you, Bob Rumson is not the least bit interested in solving it. He is interested in two things and two things only: making you afraid of it and telling you who's to blame for it. That, ladies and gentlemen, is how you win elections.".