The George H.W. Bush Horrible HBO Documentary Drinking Game

"Our love needs a transfusion, so let's shoot it full of wine!"Wang Jianwei/ChinaFotoPress/ZUMA Press

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


41, a new film about former President George H.W. Bush, takes a slurp-and-nuzzle approach to the political documentary.

The documentary—premiering Thursday at 9 p.m. EST on HBO—two days after the ex-prez celebrated his 88th birthday—is a hideously fawning look at the man and his career. (This might have had something to do with the fact that the film was executive-produced by Jerry Weintraub, a Hollywood Walk-of-Famer with close ties to the Bush family.)

With a career in public service as rich and controversial as that of Bush, any competent documentarian would have more than enough to drool over. Where to begin? Iran-Contra, perhaps? The brutal campaign blitzes engineered by Lee Atwater, maybe? Operation Just Cause?

To hell with all that! Director Jeffrey Roth and his crew are too busy showcasing an 87-year-old George Bush hobbling around the family estate and talking about how much he loves his tiny pet dog Bibi. Also, he spends a lot of time boating, so much so that Former President George H.W. Bush is ON A BOAT TAKE A GOOD HARD LOOK AT THE MOTHERFUCKING BOAT would have been a usable alternative title.

While 41 makes for a bland film, it does have potential. That is, if you make it interactive. Thus, the George H.W. Bush Horrible HBO Documentary Drinking Game.

Take one shot for… (recommended beverages: Bulleit, Bagpiper, and The Kraken)

  • A wave crashing on a shore
  • Grainy footage of toddlers toddling
  • Black-and-white photos of toddlers toddling
  • H.W. saying the word “mother”
  • H.W. saying the word “school”
  • Communist iconography popping up on screen
  • A dog, cat, or chipmunk moving
  • H.W. swearing
  • H.W. bashing the liberal media

Down two shots for… (recommended: L’CHAIM, Voodoo Tiki, and Hibiki)

  • H.W. saying “Yale”
  • H.W. saying “naked”
  • A photo of H.W. and the Gipper
  • Soldiers marching
  • A seagull cawing
  • H.W. praising a Democratic ex-POTUS
  • Something exploding
  • H.W. talking about a girl he once lusted after
  • every time H.W. has both hands on a wheel
  • H.W. saying “gorilla”
  • A duck in water
  • H.W. introducing Bill Clinton to somebody new

Finish your beer for… (recommended: Singha, Pliny the Elder, and Natty Light)

  • H.W. saying “fluff-ball” or “puff-ball”
  • H.W. standing next to Asian people
  • H.W. pointing his walking cane at something
  • An image of an animal H.W. has killed and gutted
  • H.W. riding a bicycle while smiling
  • H.W. carrying a small child in his arms
  • H.W. jumping out of aircraft
  • H.W. using the term “noble calling”

Now, if you’re still upright, check out this video of executive producer Jerry Weintraub getting interviewed by…one of the guys who really helped throw H.W. out of office:

video platform video management video solutions video player

Click here for more movie and TV features from Mother Jones. To read more of Asawin’s reviews, click here.

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate