Read Bush Sr.’s Lips In New HBO Bio-Doc

41 (Dir. Jeffrey Roth, 2012) 

Our 41st President, George Herbert Walker Bush, tells his story in this HBO produced bio doc releasing today on DVD. In the film, which premiered on the premium cable channel last June, Bush Sr. guides us around his peaceful beachfront property in Kennebunkport, Maine, and sits down with director Jeffrey Roth’s to muse over the highs and lows of his life in and out of the political spotlight.

Although I’m not a fan of the man, watching the film helped put Bush Sr.’s life in better perspective for me. The one-termer is mainly remembered in the world of pop culture via appearances on The Simpsons (voiced by Harry Shearer), THE BIG LEBOWSKI’s appropriation by the Dude of his “this aggression will not stand” statement, and Dana Carvey’s exaggerated impression on SNL reruns, so he’s greatly humanized here.

In tons of sepia-tinted photographs we learn how Bush was highly competitive in his youth - he was a soccer captain, a football quarterback, and a basketball player. In one of his most affecting anecdotes, Bush speaks of his time in the Navy in World War II. Some of the most fascinating footage the film has to offer is of his rescue at sea on September 2nd, 1944 after his plane was shot down.

From there, prompted by the occasional soft-spoken (and often soft-ball) question by Roth, Bush touches on his marriage, his college years at Yale, his oil company career, his senate runs, C.I.A. Director duties, loyalty to Nixon (he sadly says he believed Nixon was innocent as long as he could), and eight years of going to funerals as Reagan’s Vice President in the ‘80s.

This gives us over an hour of material before we get to Bush’s four years in the White House. It’s funny that his V.P. Dan Quayle is never mentioned (we see his name on campaign signs in pictures and footage, and there’s maybe a fleeting shot or two of him but his name is never said). As Quayle was possibly the most ridiculed Vice President in history maybe this is a good idea, and it should be noted along the same lines that Bush talks more about every breed of dog he’s owned than he does of any of his six children.

May hot button topics are glossed over - his son’s much criticized presidency is only mentioned in passing, the Japan vomiting incident never comes up, and the stern elder refuses to talk about Ross Perot, etc. – so this is as respectful a portrait as you’d expect, one that could play on a loop during the visiting hours at the George Bush Presidential Library and Museum. Bush does express regret for that “Read my lips, no new taxes” promise that he didn't keep, but that doesn't stain the glorified puff-piece portrait Roth and HBO are painting here.

However, Roth’s bio-doc isn’t boring as one might reasonably expect it to be.

The well edited 100 minutes goes by swiftly, with a wealth of perfectly chosen images and video (footage of Bush, having just lost the election for a second term, greeting Clinton in the Oval Office is particularly moving), so perhaps it’s a stocking stuffer gift idea for that Republican relative who reveres the former president. Those people exist, right?

The 88-year old Bush Sr. right now is recovering in a Texas Hospital for a lingering cough, so even though it’s sanitized for his protection, 41 is an apt look back at the man’s none-too-shabby legacy.

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DVD Review: CANDYMAN: THE DAVID KLEIN STORY

CANDYMAN: THE DAVID KLEIN STORY

(Dir. Costa Botes, 2011)

The best documentaries teach you something surprising about a subject that you’ve lived with a long time. In this exemplary doc, the subject here is Jelly Bellys – the jelly bean candies that come in a large assortment of flavors.

It has been well documented that President Ronald Reagan was a fan of Jelly Bellys (a facet which is nicely covered in this doc), but what’s not as well known that over 30 years ago, the inventor of the gourmet candy, the Los Angeles based businessman/sweets tycoon wannabe David Klein, sold the trademark, in an extremely questionable deal, just before it hit the big time.

Klein: “I regret the day I came up with them I really do…because it’s ruined my life.”

Klein’s story is told here by the man himself, his son Bert who narrates the bulk of the picture, as well as through a colorful array of photos, clips of Klein in the guise of “Mr. Gumdrop” or "Mr. Jelly Belly" hawking the product on shows like “The Mike Douglas Show”, and insightful interviews with family and colleagues (another celebrity fan of the candy – ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic even appears to put in his two cents).

Jelly Bellys took a while to take off (Klein: “I literally couldn’t give it away”) mainly because they were expensive ($3.50 a pound), but they, of course, were eventually embraced as the “first choice candy for the disco generation.”

Klein arguably revolutionized the candy industry, so it’s a sad turn of events that leaves him with no stake in the incredibly popular product he created.

It’s even sadder because of Klein’s lovably quirky manner (he would buy 100 balloons to individually hand out to kids when visiting Disneyland) and his insanely inventive ideas – after losing Jelly Bellys he created scores of candy (albeit well less successful) like “Gourmet Gumdrops”, “Triple Dipple” (3 flavored Candy Corn), “Candy Snot” (yes, some of these are disgusting), and “I Can’t Believe It’s So Sour” (the first sour flavored liquorish candy).

Obviously none of these were as successful as Jelly Bellys.

Klein’s son Bert, who became a successful animator for Disney, does a great job of relating this fascinating story of an American dream gone sour (sorry). That his father overcame depression (though some bitterness is evident in some of his sound-bites here) and still perseveres making candy (such as his daughter’s Roxanne’s “Sandy Candy”) is inspiring and terrifically touching.

You’ll never look at a Jelly Belly the same way again.

Special Features: 2 Commentaries with director Costa Botes on one, Bert & David Klein on the other, over 25 minutes of deleted scenes, and the theatrical trailer.

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