When Vantage Point begins, President Ashton (played by William Hurt) is assassinated in a public square in Salamanca, Spain, or so it seems. After a few rewinds of tapes of the event, director Pete Travis appears to promise a Rashomon (1950) whodunit, the film is mostly a few chase scenes that converge as a van carrying the real President swerves to avoid hitting a young girl. Viewers may count the number of autos crashed and persons gunned down if they want, but the political insights provided in the general release thriller are that presidents sometimes use doubles for public events, and that a wise president will resist the temptation to call for an immediate airstrike of terrorists who might or might not be responsible. President Ashton, in other words, is more mindful of the strength given to terrorists when the United States mindlessly reins down bombs in an Arab-speaking friendly country. MH
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