New doco examines how the FBI investigates US presidents - especially Trump

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This was published 5 years ago

New doco examines how the FBI investigates US presidents - especially Trump

By Brad Newsome

With so many entertainment options, it's easy to miss brilliant TV shows, movies and documentaries. Here are the ones to hit or skip.

Enemies: The President, Justice & the FBI
Stan

"The only thing that can destroy the United States is us, by allowing our constitution and the rule of law to disintegrate," says Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Tim Weiner at the start of this new documentary series.

"It is the FBI that is sworn to uphold the rule of law ... What is the FBI to do when the president breaks his own oath?"

History suggests that the FBI's general instinct is to go after presidents at least as hard as it would go after any other suspect. Each of the four episodes in this series looks at the FBI's investigation of a different president - Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and Donald Trump - but it's all very much about Trump.

Executive producer and Oscar-winning documentarian Alex Gibney (Taxi to the Dark Side, Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief) uses Weiner's 2012 book Enemies: A History of the FBI as a guide to the crises of previous presidents, but what he and director Jed Rothstein are looking for is clues to how the Trump-Russia investigation might play out.

John Dean appears in Enemies: The President, Justice & the FBI on Stan.

John Dean appears in Enemies: The President, Justice & the FBI on Stan. Credit: Stan

One lesson from the Clinton fiasco is that hyper-partisanship makes it extremely difficult for the public to work out whether accusations and revelations are real or part of the politcal game.

Another from Reagan's Iran-Contra scandal is that popularity can help you get away with things - a fact that Trump himself has cheerfully explained on more than one occasion. But, as Watergate showed, much depends on whether the people around you will flip or carry the can.

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Of course the Trump episode (a feature-length one directed by Gibney) leaves the whole story hanging, but there's always room for another episode once everything has washed out one way or another.

The first three episodes, though, aren't merely useful recaps of important events whose details might have blurred with the passing of time - they're cracking stories in themselves, and they remind us that there's nothing really new under the sun.

Former Reagan attorney-general Ed Meese.

Former Reagan attorney-general Ed Meese.Credit: Stan

Rothstein makes great use of his many interviewees. The ground-level FBI agents who conducted history-making interviews and investigations give riveting first-hand accounts.

Insights into the thinking of the presidents and their inner circles are provided by the likes of John Dean (Nixon's White House counsel and a Watergate insider who became the prosecution's star witness), former Reagan attorney-general Ed Meese, and former Clinton chief-of-staff Leon Panetta.

Kurt Russell stars in The Christmas Chronicles.

Kurt Russell stars in The Christmas Chronicles. Credit: Netflix

The Christmas Chronicles
Netflix

Kurt Russell as Santa Claus? What better way for Netflix to plant a big, fur-trimmed boot into the old-fashioned Christmas-movie caper?

This thoroughly enjoyable confection begins with sweet-natured 10-year-old Kate (Darby Camp) and her surly teenage brother, Teddy (Judah Lewis) setting a camera trap for old Saint Nick.

They then find themselves stowed away in a gravity-defying sleigh and spooking certain reindeer into a white-knuckle bolt through Boston's chilly, airliner-infested skies. Director Clay Katis (The Angry Birds Movie) makes the CGI elves a lot of fun.

Nippers of Dead Bird Bay is on Comedy Central.

Nippers of Dead Bird Bay is on Comedy Central.

Nippers of Dead Bird Bay
comedycentral.com.au

Dead Bird Bay looks like any place on the Australian coast where the sand meets the sea and the crabs creep awkwardly past the discarded condoms.

But it's a place where laws of physics and narrative don't apply, and where the sight of children swearing and being sworn at is an inexhaustible source of chuckles - at least for four 10-minute episodes.

The delightful Anne Edmonds supplies many of the expletives as her character puts her pint-sized lifesavers through their paces. Gore and adult male nudity ensue.

Julia Baker is Snake Boss.

Julia Baker is Snake Boss.

Snake Boss
Amazon Prime Video

It's all go as pastry chef turned snake catcher Julia Baker sets about rounding up some of Brisbane's deadliest reptiles - often with Scottish boyfriend Johnny Bagpipes stuffed snugly into the sidecar of her motorcycle.

There's no shortage of serpents for them and little snake-sniffing dog Bonnie to tangle with - everything from deadly eastern browns to ornery carpet pythons and agitated little whip snakes.

It's interesting, unpretentious stuff that aims to make people more kindly disposed towards snakes.

Rupert Friend stars as Ernest Donovan in Strange Angel.

Rupert Friend stars as Ernest Donovan in Strange Angel. Credit: CBS

Strange Angel
10 All Access

Sometimes a rocket takes off like a ... well ... you know. Other times it just sits on the launch pad fizzing and sputtering.

You'd think that the extraordinary true story of Jack Parsons - the self-educated pre-war rocket engineer who helped found NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, joined the esoteric movement founded by British occultist Aleister Crowley, and wound up involved with L. Ron Hubbard before meeting a most untimely demise - would simply scorch its way across the screen from the word "Go".

Oddly, though, it's a much slower burn, and Parsons, as played by Jack Reynor (Glassland) and his Clark Gable moustache, is less charming rogue than reckless, selfish loose cannon.

The more intriguing characters are Parsons' conflicted wife, Susan (Bella Heathcote), and their unsettling, hedonistic neighbour, Ernest (Rupert Friend) - who isn't quite what he first appears to be.

But if you're not expecting an immediate bang, the production design and scripts by series creator Mark Heyman (Black Swan) paint an absorbing picture of 1930s Los Angeles, its landscapes and its mores.

Monty Don's Italian Gardens is on Netflix now.

Monty Don's Italian Gardens is on Netflix now.

Monty Don's Italian Gardens
Netflix

British gardening-TV presenter Monty Don finds eye-popping gardens fit for emperors in this absorbing series. One of them actually belonged to an emperor, Hadrian, who had a 15km aqueduct constructed to fill his many pools and ponds.

Water features also define other grand gardens built by enormously rich cardinals vying for the papacy in the 15th century.

Don does a fine job of explaining the design of the gardens and the fascinating history behind them. Well worth a look, even if you're no great gardener yourself.

*Stan is a joint venture between Fairfax Media, which publishes this website, and the Nine Network.

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