CHICAGO, Illinois, October 19, 2007 – President George W. Bush is shot and killed by sniper-fire after delivering a speech to business leaders on economic policy. Minutes after Bush is declared dead, Vice-President Dick Cheney takes the oath of office and is now the 44th President of the United States.

Sound like a bad dream? It’s the digitally-created reality in Gabriel Range’s controversial new film Death of a President.

Named after the famous chronicle of the Kennedy assassination, this dreamlike mocu-drama begins with the fatal shots, then focuses on the political and social fallout of this watershed event. A massive, racial-profiling manhunt is hatched to catch the shooter, with a man of Syrian descent initially targeted to take the fall. Meanwhile, the federal government reacts by imposing a series of harsh new laws and security measures.

Well into the trial of prime suspect Jamal Abu Zikri, the jury is sent away to deliberate with nothing but a pile of vague forensic evidence and questionably obtained al-Qaeda associations linking him to the crime. Other suspects who don’t fit the Middle Eastern description are simply overlooked. As the official scapegoat, Abu Zikri, who may very well be innocent, is pretty much fucked. If convicted there’s no doubt he’ll fry faster than an egg in the hot Texan sun. It’s an enraging, unjust situation, which has become typical of an America that has made a habit of taking fierce action based on dubious claims-remember those WMDs that never turned up?

This film is clearly a portrait of a government that uses tragedy as an excuse to seek retribution brashly and with ruthless abandon. It’s in such moments of emotional agitation that it’s worth reminding yourself that here, the partisan media circus isn’t real, although thanks to the slick computer effects it looks pretty damn convincing. Range mixes archival footage with staged talking-head interviews and docu-style drama to deliver an unsettling and all-too convincing shot of worst-case-senario agit-prop. It also sends a cautionary message to anyone actually thinking of offing Bush: would you rather Dick Cheney be president? Didn’t think so.

While Range’s digital stunt-and some critics have boiled it down to just that-could easily have been a Bush-basher’s wet dream, the director treats his subject with an earnest seriousness, resisting the urge to crack any kind of knowing smile to rabid lefties during his hypothetical creation. There is no dramatic indulgence or spectacle in what for some might be the most gratifying scene of the film. Bush, fatally shot, collapses below-screen at the sound of two silenced gunshots. The chilling sequence is over in the blink of an eye.

In Washington, Vice-President Dick Cheney is swiftly sworn-in as the new Commander-in-Chief, and doesn’t waste any time vengefully drafting Patriot Act III, which serves to further expand the intrusive powers of the federal government.

Range’s film also considers the manner in which Bush’s party may have turned a tragedy like 9/11 into a political tool for furthering a pre-conceived agenda. On the streets, a discriminatory manhunt, the kind that would likely ensue after such an event, targets any person of Middle Eastern descent. The strategy is justified by certain lawmakers who deny its racist basis and maintain that under the circumstances it is the smart thing to do.

Not unlike many recent films, Death of a President embodies a wave of popular frustration with the Bush administration’s chronic mishandling of a number of key issues. Their inability to secure the U.S.-Mexican border, a failed social security agenda, the un-popular and unsuccessful attempt to force democracy upon a shattered Iraq, and the ineffective and bungled response to Hurricane Katrina have all contributed to the widespread distaste and mistrust of the president and the Republican Party as a whole.

Now with U.S. mid-term elections only days away, and with the Republicans on the verge of losing their control of the House and Senate, the title of this film may serve as a fitting metaphor for the American political climate in the coming weeks and months.

Range’s film offers one final warning: if you’re scared of what a president can do when he’s alive, just imagine what he can inspire as a martyr.