Political films both biased and insightful

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With the second presidential debate set to air tonight and the election itself less than four weeks away, several movies focusing on each candidate either have hit theaters, are about to hit theaters or are now available on video and DVD.

Four are reviewed here: “Going Upriver: The Long War of John Kerry,” which is decidedly pro-Kerry; “Buried in the Sand: The Deception of America” and “George W. Bush: Faith in the White House,” which are decidedly pro-Bush; and Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9/11,” which is, shall we say, one burning bush.

Every one of them is biased, some more so than others.

First, there’s George Butler’s “Going Upriver: The Long War of John Kerry,” which has yet to open in Maine, but will do so soon at Waterville’s Railroad Square. Initially, the movie feels like a slick, manufactured campaign video for Kerry until it digs in to present a stirring account of the Vietnam War and Kerry’s involvement in it.

As directed by Butler, a Kerry confidant best known for his 1977 documentary on Arnold Schwarzenegger, “Pumping Iron,” “Going Upriver” uses archival footage, photographs and several eyewitness accounts to present an in-depth examination of Kerry’s record in Vietnam.

This includes an account of the swift boat incident that has caused such a furor in recent months due to the work of John O’Neill, a Kerry detractor who succeeded in launching the misleading Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign.

It’s O’Neill’s obvious dislike for Kerry that’s revealed in the film’s most compelling scene, a riveting 1971 clip from “The Dick Cavett Show,” in which a youthful O’Neill and Kerry spar over the war. Cavett was known for great TV, and now, 33 years later, he proves timely again. It was, after all, the Nixon administration that courted O’Neill, a Vietnam vet, to smear Kerry in an effort to discredit him. Now, in 2004, O’Neill is trying to do it all over again.

“Going Upriver” is gung-ho Kerry, for sure, and moments are uncomfortably glossy.

Still, when it’s at its best, it does a credible job in examining Kerry’s leadership and conviction as a young man at Yale, preparing for combat in Vietnam, and then returning home to a nation unwilling to welcome him or his comrades. This cool reception and his experiences in the war led him to form the Vietnam Veterans Against the War effort. At age 27, he was the voice for thousands of vets when he took to the Capitol and gave a speech to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that put Vietnam into a new, sharper focus – and Kerry himself on the political map.

In stark contrast to “Going Upriver” is “Buried in the Sand: The Deception of America,” which lists no director or writer, and it’s easy to see why.

As hosted by conservative political commentator Mark Taylor, the movie is a stomach-turning exploitation of the torture Saddam Hussein inflicted upon his people and on Westerners during his reign. It purports to be “a true look at the hearts and minds of our enemy,” a movie that wants to take on the media, which is “not telling the American people the truth.”

Apparently, for Taylor and the film’s distributor, Can You Handle Life Pictures, telling that truth is best done not through a thoughtful discourse or assembling of the facts, but through a graphic, 90-minute horror show filled with decapitations, amputations, beatings, suicide bombings, smashed limbs, broken faces, the burning, dragging and hanging of American soldiers, and mass torture, all at the hands of Saddam’s men.

For those who recall “The Faces of Death” series, “Buried in the Sand” is that for a new generation. In an alleged effort to explain why Bush went to war with Iraq, it presents a sleazy, stack-the-deck kind of filmmaking. Sitting before a chain-link fence, the grave Taylor mentions an atrocity – a decapitation, for instance, or the severing of a hand – and then presents several unedited examples on the television next to him. The result is vile, exploitative garbage, depicting the majority of Iraqis as extremist monsters, which is simply not the case.

Also whipped into a froth and decidedly pro-Bush is “George W. Bush: Faith in the White House,” a brief, 70-minute documentary from Grizzly Adams Productions that is offered, according to the film’s advertising campaign, as an inspirational alternative to “Fahrenheit 9/11.”

It’s produced by the same people who produce the PAX-TV series “Encounters with the Unexplained,” and it examines, among other things, the faith and morality that guide our president.

Like all of the movies mentioned here, “Faith in the White House” has a built-in audience it serves, one that, in this case, may not spend too much time worrying about how Bush balances his public conviction with God with his public duty to the nation. It’s for those who see little conflict in the fact that Bush named Christ as his favorite philosopher and that he said to evangelist James Robinson that he felt that God had called upon him to run for president, as if his presidency were some sort of divine appointment.

“Faith in the White House” is cheaply produced, crammed with phony re-enactments and stands tall as propaganda, but in spite of all its rantings and shortcomings, it’s nevertheless fascinating and telling.

The most discussed movie of the lot is Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9/11.” Just out on video and DVD, the film is divisive, outrageous, important and troubling. It’s also funny and insightful, dark and misleading – a zeitgeist that has polarized audiences since its release.

Winner of the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, the movie did exactly what Moore intended for it to do – it launched a national debate about the state of the world as influenced by the Bush administration.

Since it’s aimed at hanging Bush by carefully assembling news reports from CNN, ABC, NBC, FOX and CBS – as well as from newspaper reports and on-the-street interviews conducted by Moore himself – the movie is pointedly never objective.

Still, it can’t be dismissed. “Fahrenheit 9/11” is filled with indelible, haunting images, with the Bush administration legitimately at the root of many of them. The most damaging include documented footage of the Bush family’s indisputable ties to the Saudis; the seven minutes during Sept. 11, 2001, when Bush sat frozen in an elementary school in spite of being told twice by his staff that America was “under attack”; the reaction of Iraqi women and children to the destruction of their country; the devastating grief of a mother who lost her son in combat.

Since fair play isn’t considered here, what’s missing are Bush’s accomplishments, particularly his shining hour in the sun, when he movingly bonded with a country still in shock in the shadow of the terrorist attacks.

The film also is hardly above taking cheap shots at Bush. For Moore, our president is a caricature, an easy individual to poke fun at, but then so are his chums Cheney, Rumsfeld and especially John Ashcroft, who breaks into song at one point and belts out a ballad he wrote himself, “Let the Eagle Soar.” It’s an astonishing moment of comedy – and the movie, while not a documentary, per se, is a blistering opinion piece worthy of consideration.

“Going Upriver: The Long War of John Kerry:” B

“Buried in the Sand: The Deception of America:” F

“George W. Bush: Faith in the White House:” B-

“Fahrenheit 9/11:” A-

Christopher Smith is the Bangor Daily News film critic. His reviews appear Mondays and Fridays in Style, 5:30 p.m. Thursdays on WLBZ 2 Bangor and WCSH 6 Portland, and are archived at RottenTomatoes.com. He may be reached at BDNFilm1@aol.com.

The Video/DVD Corner

Renting a video or a DVD? NEWS film critic Christopher Smith can help.

Below are his grades of recent releases in video stores.

Those in bold print are new to video stores this week.

Against the Ropes ? D

The Alamo ? D

Barbershop 2: Back in Business ? B+

Connie and Carla ? B

Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights ? D

Dogville ? B

Ella Enchanted ? B

Envy ? D

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind ? A-

Fahrenheit 9/11 ? A-

50 First Dates ? C+

Fog of War ? A

George W. Bush: Faith in the White House ? B-

The Girl Next Door ? C+

Hidalgo ? C

Home on the Range ? C-

House of Sand and Fog ? B+

The Human Stain ? D

In America ? A-

Jersey Girl ? C+

Johnson Family Vacation ? D

Kill Bill Vol. 2 ? B

The Ladykillers ? B+

The Last Samurai ? C

Laws of Attraction ? C-

Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King ? A-

Man on Fire ? B

Mean Girls ? B+

Miracle ? B+

Monsieur Ibrahim ? B+

Monster ? A

New York Minute ? D

The Passion of the Christ ? B+

The Punisher ? C

Soul Plane ? D

Starsky & Hutch ? D

The Station Agent ? B+

Super Size Me ? C-

Taking Lives ? C

13 Going On 30 ? B

The Triplets of Belleville ? A

Twisted ? D-

Walking Tall ? C