The President's Analyst

Amazon.com

Greenwich Village satirist Theordore J. Flicker made one of the zaniest spy spoofs of the '60s--the ultimate in paranoia and conspiracy. James Coburn stars as a hip New York psychiatrist recruited by his mentor to take on the president as his exclusive patient. After quitting his job because of the stress, he's forced to go into hiding when spies from all sides want to know his secrets. The social and political satire never lets up, as the usually unflappable Coburn becomes completely neurotic. Godfrey Cambridge is hilarious as his cohort and former patient (his opening monologue about self-hatred is a classic), and so is Severn Darden, who plays a charming Russian agent. A true original with the utmost retro appeal today. --Bill Desowitz

Customer Reviews:

That's my car gun. *snickers*.......2007-04-10

I just think James Coburn is sexy. If you like the camp of the Flint movies, give it a try. It is not as delicious, feels more dated, somehow, not so iconic, but some good moments. Seeing lanky Coburn dressed as a wigged hippie banging a gong will give you a good long laugh.

Required reading for anyone in the Internet biz.......2006-12-03

This film is a true classic - it captures a time, place, and mood with remarkable clarity, but moreover, it predicted the future with amazing prescience.

Everyone involved in the communications revolution should know about "TPC" and "Arlington Hewes".

The President's Analyst.......2006-11-05

My husband and I are both James Coburn fans but we found this movie to be unwatchable. The story line is boring in that you just keep seeing him getting called in the middle of the night and then leaving the President's room. We watched this once and will not waste the time on watching it again.

A '60s Cult Classic.......2006-08-18

This is one of the great cult classics of the 1960s. It rolls all of the political, racial, gender, corporate and establishment fears, misunderstandings, stereotypes and psychosis of the '60s cultural revolution into a big ball and then throws it at the nearest bureaucrat. No matter how often you watch this film, you always find something new that you didn't see the last time.

Coming soon : Gulliver's Travels through the webosphere?.......2006-07-29

This 1967 movie may seem dated to some, it's a product of the now mythologised "swinging sixties" but classy, unpretentious and funny satire, like "The President's Analyst" is really ageless.

Jonathan Swift's 1726 "Gulliver's Travels" was a satire on British politics of his day. Gulliver, marooned on Lilliput, met it's six inch high inhabitants. They were in mortal conflict with similarly vertically challenged neighbours, the Blefuscu. Their war was a holy war based on different ways to crack open boiled eggs. Do you open the big end or little end first? Swift was drawing attention to how small policy differences between the Whigs and Tories were inflated into cosmic conflicts by politicians who benefited from the controversy. The story hasn't got old.

"The President's Analyst", of course, isn't classic literature like Swift but it still packs a punch. It variously satirises modern American politics, the Beatles ("the puddlians"), the power of technology (TPC's plan for "a brain chip"), the cold war (the stock portfolio of Kydor Kropotkin ), psychiatry, gun ownership, inter-service rivalry within government (the "FBR" versus the "CEA" that is much more deadly than any East-West rivalry), the bizarre "Spy Vs Spy" world of espionage (who knows how many agencies are chasing the protagonists!) and the modern corporate state (The TPC's secret agenda to control the country by controlling the president by controlling his psychiatrist).

Gulliver is our tour guide through Swift's various satirical worlds. In "The President's Analyst", the ever cool James Coburn as Dr. Sidney Schaefer, plays the same role.

My guess is that before too long this movie will be remade for the X-box internet cell phone generation. Hollywood doesn't seem to write much new material these days. It's probably more relevant today. We're already seeing RFID tracking chips ("Spychips") being inserted into dogs and cats as well as human beings. The connected always on world is an everyday reality. So intead of being dated, maybe "The President's Analyst" was really ahead of it's time.

Charlie Rose - Mark Halperin/Don Van Natta & Jeff Gerth (July 6, 2007)

Average customer rating:

Charlie Rose - Mark Halperin/Don Van Natta & Jeff Gerth (July 6, 2007)

Manufacturer: Charlie Rose
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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