Oliver Stone's “W.” isn't wicked. It's wild and pretty wonderful.

Who would've thought the notorious director of “JFK” and “Nixon” could temper his partisan politics to fashion an evenhanded film that's funny, fascinating and frightening?

“W.” takes the man seriously. Stone doesn't make that claim, but simply produces an engagingly cinematic story of a good ol' boy with profound father issues who probably should've never run for the world's most powerful office; he had something to prove to the man he called “Poppy,” even into adulthood.

Josh Brolin, who next plays Dan White, the murderous San Francisco supervisor in the upcoming “Milk,” gets at the heart of Bush from his frat-boy days at Yale (Stone was in the same freshman class before dropping out to fight in Vietnam), to his problematic drinking, to the heartache of being second in the eyes of his dad, President George H.W. Bush, portrayed brilliantly by James Cromwell.

“Your brother Jeb graduated Phi Beta Kappa,” he tells his son. “What'd you get, C's?”

Brolin has the speech patterns and body language down, and it's a long way from Will Ferrell and his “strategery” “Saturday Night Live” impersonation. This is a penetrating portrait of a man who'd dreamed of playing center field for a major league baseball team, and, in the end, would rather be having a beer with the boys than setting Iraq policy that would take his country down a calamitous path from which it still hasn't recovered.

What's daring about “W.” is the chutzpah at taking on the life of a sitting president who has been slammed for ineptitude, a den of hawkish advisers and poor command of the language.

Though some of that is certainly there, Stone avoids cheap shots. Instead, amid the mangled language — “Is our children learning?” Bush says about an education program — there's the deep love affair with Laura Bush (classy Elizabeth Banks), her support unwavering through the toughest of times.

They meet at a friend's barbecue, he a fledgling politician, she a librarian who campaigned for Eugene McCarthy and voted for LBJ.

Stone, the combat veteran who was wounded twice, earned the Bronze Star for Valor and directed “Platoon,” has a soft side when it comes to “Bushie” and Laura.

George Sr. and Barbara Bush are chronicled as failed parents — the father telling the son, “You disappoint me, Junior, deeply disappoint me,” the mom (shrewish Ellen Burstyn) discouraging him from running for governor of Texas — “you can't possibly win,” and then he does. It's a dysfunctional family.

The film opens with Bush daydreaming of being at a ballpark and catching a fly ball deep against the center field fence. Then it snaps into the reality of an Oval Office meeting after 9/11, the president surrounded by his closest advisers. The topic: What to call the enemy? After spirited debate, it's decided — “Axis of Evil.”

Stone did a remarkable job casting Bush's White House coterie. Among the eeriest: Richard Dreyfuss, who gets at the personality of Vice President Dick Cheney, his mean streak and scariness. In one deft scene, sharing lunch with the president following 9/11, power-hungry Cheney says, “This is a fulcrum in history, everything is coming together in your presidency.”

Later, when asked about an exit strategy for Iraq, Cheney chillingly says, peering at a map of the area's vast oil fields, “There is no exit. We stay.”

Superb Jeffrey Wright is not a physical match for Secretary of State Colin Powell, but the actor captures the loneliness of standing up alone for restraint only to deliver the devastating “Weapons of Mass Destruction” speech at the United Nations. This is a tragic figure.

One portrayal misses badly: Thandie Newton's Condoleezza Rice. She's all costume, hairstyle and dippy speech pattern. It only evokes laughter.

In one of the movie's best moments, Stacy Keach, as evangelical TV pastor Earle Hudd, guides Bush into his born-again awakening. “People say I was born with a silver spoon,” Bush cries to a comforting Hudd. “But they don't know the burden it carries.”

Stone based his recreations on research — books, transcripts and interviews. Screenwriter Stanley Weiser, who co-wrote the director's “Wall Street,” taps into a font of real personalities. It's not a hatchet job.

There's a scene at a military hospital of Bush visiting soldiers, one with missing limbs, another severely burned. He's touched, and you're touched for him.

Stone does get cute with the music, utilizing less-than-original choices like “Mama, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys,” “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights,” “The Yellow Rose of Texas” and the overused “Spirit in the Sky.” His picks could've shown more spirit.

What the movie says in the end, and well, is how important these eight years have been: their impact on our lives and the life of the world, our allies and enemies, and to know who it is we're electing president of the United States of America.

Stone teams once again with editor Joe Hutching, who won Oscars for “Born on the 4th of July” and “JFK,” to weave together coherently this brilliant collection of sequences.

For Oliver Stone, “W.” is mission accomplished.

“W.” Rated: PG-13. Running time: 2 hours, 9 minutes. 3.5 stars.

To find out more about Lee Grant and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

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