LEE Atwater, the wunderkind 1980s po litical operative who helped get George H.W. Bush elected, was guilty of smearing, fomenting racial antagonism and name-calling.
Or so says “Boogie Man,” a documentary that uses against Atwater images of lynch mobs, decades-old racist comments of his onetime boss Strom Thurmond, and a clip of Bryant Gumbel calling him “the architect of the evil campaign.”
Atwater, who died at age 40 of brain cancer, is most famous for an allegedly “racist” ad that illustrated 1988 presidential candidate Mike Dukakis’ unfortunate habit of letting killers out of prison on furlough. The ad featured a revolving door motif cast with an almost entirely white group of inmates. In an unintentionally hilarious moment that’s like a parody of “JFK,” the revolving door ad is played in slo-mo so Sam Donaldson can huff that Atwater’s racism is unmasked by a brief glance cast at the camera by the only black prisoner shown.
Atwater’s painful early demise, and his deathbed statements about his regrets, seem to delight the largely left-leaning pundits assessing Atwater’s legacy, which inspired Karl Rove, among others. Howard Fineman of Newsweek, for instance, says, “Life gets even with you in the end,” an ugly comment that sounds like the liberal equivalent of calling AIDS God’s punishment for gays.
More interesting are the anecdotes served by Atwater’s fellow consultants and competitors, such as Ed Rollins and Roger Stone, who notes that Atwater poured hot sauce on everything, even ice cream.
As for former Clinton operative Terry McAuliffe, who (apropos of nothing) calls Ken Starr “perverted” for publishing a truthful report, and Dukakis, who to this day won’t apologize for letting Horton out to rape someone, their motivations are evident.
Running time: 86 minutes. Not rated (profanity). At the Cinema Village, 22 E. 12th Street.