Customer Reviews

Executive Power

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Another one of those politically motivated thrillers in which the President's liaison with a lovely intern becomes a disaster when the girl dies while making out with the Prez. Secret Service agents cover up the deed so the president can get re-elected, but one of the agents has a conscience and didn't want to do it. Now three years later, he's approached by the president to come up with an incriminating videotape.
Its all farfetched and unfortunately slowpaced, but it's not an awful movie, just average. Talented cast features Craig Sheffer, Joanna Cassidy, William Atherton, Andrea Roth and John Heard.

This is a low budget film featuring a lot of character actors in a suspense thriller. It is loosely based on fictionalized real events, as interpreted from a certain viewpoint.

The advisor to the President is found dead, a suicide they say. Others think it was a murder disguised to look like a suicide. [Where is the Medical Examiner to settle this question?] The victim was in the habit of videotaping friends, sometimes secretly, as in the case of his girlfriend. But after his death, all of his videotapes disappeared. His girlfriend's apartment was burglarized, and all her videotapes stolen. Could it be "a movie buff"?

The ongoing action shows powerful forces, like a Federal Agency, bent on finding "the tape" no matter how many bodies they have to step over. The hail of gunshots punctuates the action, as if from the hidden agenda of Gun Prohibitionists. The usual Hollywood trick of the hero out shooting a half-dozen of his opponents occurs to serve as a means of changing scenes. It shows the "Secret Service" acting like a Secret Police, running amok through the streets. The low budget for this film avoids street scenes filled with people.

This tape is important because the President is only weeks away from election, and does not want a Watergate-type scandal to interfere. Does this hidden tape contain a Presidential scandal? Does it affect others close to the President? All in all, a good action movie. The ending was telegraphed earlier, so I didn't find it shocking. What would be more shocking would be for the President's daughter to use Federal Agents to eliminate a lover who became a potential source for scandal.