The doc actually got Cheney to sit down and talk through his entire career, controversies, conspiracies and all, splices in relevant (and often rare) news/private footage, and contains new interviews with virtually everyone involved in Cheney's life and career (with the exception of the Bushes and those deceased, of course).
I suspect Vice may end up feeling unbelievable or dramatized by depicting Cheney as a hybrid between characters like Frank Underwood and Jafar, but who fancies himself a sort of necessary anti-hero. I highly suggest watching the doc to get an idea of just how absurd and unprecedented the whole Cheney saga actually was—even from his own perspective—and how frighteningly calculated and almost self-righteous he was.
Cheney not only freely admits, but proudly and amusedly reflects on things like manipulating Bush into being offered VP, persuading him to shift the balance of power in Cheny's favor, intimidating and purposefully misleading congress and other elected representatives to get in line with his agenda (including things like using false and/or knowingly suspect intel to justify war and torture, misrepresenting situations and bills to get the votes he wanted, straight up concealing his more indefensible actions, and setting up traps that put those he needed for action in difficult or impossible situations and then presenting what he wanted as a solution or leveraging his aid in exchange for what he needed).
He doesn’t explicitly confirm any war profiteering as his motivation, but if I remember correctly, he does happily acknowledge the Halliburton contracts that “happened” to benefit him.
My take away is that Cheney is the perfect candidate for a pathological character study. He seemed to be operating under an ideological and Machiavellian "the ends justify the means," and appears to believe everything he did was necessary and consistent to his views, even when he felt like the “greater good” required some unethical or seemingly unlawful actions on his part to circumvent the US government’s checks and balances and the general reluctance of the American people to go to war.
The scene in the Vice trailer where Cheney is sitting down with Bush about the Vice Presidency is what sparked this post. It seems dramatized, but the true story is seriously manipulative and absurd:
Cheney first declined the office before actually being offered or considered, to get Bush to start associating him with the role. He offered to be on the selection team, but during private conversations with Bush, he convinced him that anyone who desired the office was morally unfit to hold it, basically disqualifying every eager candidate. He then continually told Bush stories of political heroes and noble figures with little "lessons" about the character of a person fit to lead, and then found ways to either act in ways that embodied those traits in front of Bush or work in stories where he painted himself that way soon after.
After assassinating the character of everyone on the list and devaluing the role of VP, Bush practically begged Cheney to run with him with the promise of making it more like a "50/50 presidency" than anything else. Bush felt like Cheney was doing him a favor when he "reluctantly" agreed, and even more so when Cheney's "50/50" responsibilities contained all that "boring and overwhelming" stuff.
That, combined with Bush coming to view Cheney as a political savant of sorts and almost a kind of mentor caused Bush to almost constantly defer to Cheney's guidance or preference, and to look the other way when he was more obviously operating in a moral gray area.
I'll also say that the doc is almost completely non-judgmental, or even over-empathetic with Cheney. But he still manages to come off villainous all on his own. Almost like the protagonist in The Informant! After everything he admits to, I have no idea how Cheney is able to live out his twilight years out in the country, fly-fishing with his friends and traveling with his family rather than inside of a prison cell. But his perspective on all of his controversy did illuminate a fascinating world view and a cohesive but chilling story of a man doing literally everything in his power to execute his will. It’s all awful, but it will make for an excellent character study and/or political thriller.
I believe it's on Amazon Prime if you're interested. Corrected in the comments, it's streaming through Showtime.
TL;DR The World According to Dick Cheney is a solid documentary in its own right, but I strongly recommend watching it before seeing Vice. I think that Cheney himself and the story of his career are so hard to believe that without getting the full history and Cheney’s personal account of his career, the movie may seem heavily dramatized. Cheney’s ideology, the scope of his influence, and how successful he was at accomplishing his agenda through manipulation and deceit is like something out of There Will Be Blood. His character, motivations, and story are all almost too archetypal and dramatic to believe as factual in modern day reality. I think the documentary will show how compelling, dark, and fascinating a movie about Cheney can be in comparison to your average biopic, and may also be a necessary antidote to your BS meters in times where the real person and events seem like they had to have been fabricated for movie characterizations, entertainment, or drama.