Death of a President
Newmarket Films | Release Date: October 27, 2006 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
49
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 30 Critic Reviews
Positive:
10
Mixed:
16
Negative:
4
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
The movie IS a provocation, but not a glib or ideologically myopic one. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
Many of its fiercest detractors may be surprised to find that it's a far more sobering piece of speculative fiction than they might have imagined. Read full review
75
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
It's more than simply a well-crafted piece of fake history. Read full review
75
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
Given the controversy, which strongly suggested that the filmmakers had it in for President Bush, the film's biggest shocker may be how kind Range and coscreenwriter Simon Finch are to him. Read full review
75
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
The excitingly well-made Death of a President imagines the assassination of President Bush as a way of analyzing political violence. And Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, sight unseen, has labeled it despicable. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianMarc Mohan
Is it a worthwhile movie? Yes, for the most part. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
A masterly piece of documentary chicanery that kills George W. Bush without once pandering to his legions of ill-wishers. Read full review
70
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
Range has a marvelous feel for the clichés and conventions of TV-news documentary, and the tone of mournful elegy he strikes here is both convincing and -- believe me, I'm shocked to be writing this -- moving. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
There's something foul about staging the assassination of a sitting president in order to push a political agenda that could just as easily have been put forward without resorting to such sensationalism. Read full review
63
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
The film is cannily made. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Death of a President is celluloid mediocrity. It's neither interesting nor convincing. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterKirk Honeycutt
As convincing as the manipulated footage of the President's death in Chicago in October 2007 is, the movie itself cannot be more unconvincing in its approach. Read full review
50
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Disappointingly, Death of a President shrinks from its promise as a piece of genuinely radical or adventurous speculative fiction. Read full review
50
Village VoiceJ. Hoberman
Dramatically inert but a minor techno-miracle, Range's movie is a faux documentary with fake talking heads and seamless digital effects. Read full review
50
PremiereEthan Alter
There's no question that Death of a President fulfills its objective as a conversation starter, but as a movie, it's sketchy at best. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
The flaw in Death of a President isn't one of morality. It's one of dramatic interest. Read full review
50
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
As skillful an artist as Range clearly is, he has gone to an awful lot of trouble to make a painfully obvious point about threats to civil liberties in a post-9/11 world. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesCarina Chocano
A technically inventive, thoughtful, but otherwise not particularly earth-shattering movie. Read full review
50
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Though the blending of archival footage into a faux documentary is occasionally clever, ultimately it's banal and unconvincing. Read full review
50
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
D.O.A.P. would be more effective, and more entertaining, if it took a cue from "Dr. Strangelove" and used Sterling Hayden's paranoid, quick-triggered Brig. Gen. Jack D. Ripper as the model for Cheney to get more outlandish behavior from him. Read full review
50
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
Death of a President wants to function as a mindless thriller that eventually makes us think -- and only after the film is over question the form that encouraged us to be mindless. These are incompatible agendas, and in the end neither is fully successful. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
By the end, there's nothing to admire except Range's technical virtuosity. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeTy Burr
Turns out to be rather less than the sum of its headlines. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
Aside from satisfying some kind of ghoulish curiosity about how such an incident could possibly happen, there's precious little in Death of a President to justify the extremity of its central conceit. Read full review
50
SlateDana Stevens
Politically noncommittal and dull. But that's exactly the problem with this 90-minute piece of cinematic trompe l'oeil. Read full review
40
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
Some will find profundity in the film's reversals and revelations, but its provocations are not particularly insightful or original. The Death of a President is, in the end, neither terribly outrageous nor especially heroic; it’s a thought experiment that traffics in received ideas. Read full review
38
Rolling StonePeter Travers
Shopworn propaganda. Read full review
30
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
Is Death of a President plausible? As political prognostication, perhaps. As a TV documentary, no way in hell. What's missing is shapeliness, suspense, narrative cunning, visual flair--in short, art. Are we really to believe that a network of the future would broadcast such a barbiturate? Read full review
25
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Depictions of an aide talking about her hospital vigil and her words of comfort to a distraught Laura Bush are creepy and exploitative -- and borderline disgusting. Read full review
12
New York PostKyle Smith
The only thing that's shocking about Death of a President is how boring it is. Read full review
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