Boogie Man provides an incisive and fascinating look at a man who sold his soul for victory.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 1, 2019

Boogie Man is an incredibly timely and relevant film that uncovers the origins of political dirty pool (Atwater was the architect of much of the attack-ad style currently being deployed in the 2008 American election).

| Aug 22, 2017

| Original Score: 4/5 | Nov 18, 2011

Fascinating to a political junkie like me who wasn't aware of the game back then.

Full Review | Dec 30, 2008

A morality tale about the sewer politics of the Republican Party since Reagan and very relevant to the 2008 elections.

| Nov 12, 2008

Director Stefan Forbes has assembled a brilliantly complex portrait that shines an unnerving light on the man who painted the landscape of contemporary American politics.

| Nov 10, 2008

By the end of Forbes' brisk, economical portrait, Atwater has been revealed as a repugnant and pathetic soul--and a political visionary, among the first to fully understand and harness the raw power of voters' fears.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 31, 2008

A cinematic smear job against Atwater would be the easiest thing in the world, but Forbes is more interested in presenting a complex character study than a piece of liberal agitprop.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 31, 2008

Conventional but absorbing.

| Original Score: B | Oct 30, 2008

Stricken with brain cancer in 1990, Atwater renounced his Machiavellian ways, but as Forbes points out, his legacy lives on in his eager proteges Karl Rove and George W. Bush.

| Oct 30, 2008

Boogie Man is a fascinating portrait of an almost likable rogue.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 30, 2008

Both fascinating and upsetting, and makes you wish politics weren't so, well, political.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 30, 2008

Positively brims over with sour-grapes hearsay and character assassination. But you just know he deserved it, right?

| Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 30, 2008

Lee Atwater is remembered as brilliant or shameful, effective or destructive, his life part American Dream, part horror movie.

| Original Score: 7/10 | Oct 27, 2008

Boogie Man does not inspire pity for Atwater but sadness that a man of such talent wasted his life and learned his lesson too late.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 24, 2008

Instead of attempting a character study, Boogie Man returns an indictment.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Oct 24, 2008

Atwater's career is viewed here with fascination and some sympathy, and the pic is sure to win votes in election season with specialty distribs and public tube mavens.

Full Review | Oct 18, 2008

Boogie Man has an awful lot to say about where America finds itself at the 2008 moment of decision.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Oct 17, 2008

electrifying

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Oct 16, 2008

It's refreshing to see a political documentary that's not just boosterism or political propaganda. If anything, this is an argument for 'cleaner' campaigning.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 9, 2008