In the new conservative documentary, “America,” Dinesh D’Souza follows his very successful anti-Obama doc, “2016: Obama’s America” with the pretentious title, “America.” In this film, the proud immigrant shames Americans who feel ashamed of their country.
Early marketing for this film was a misleading gimmick, urging the question “What would the world be like if America never existed?” Shots from the beginning of the film, which included an alternate outcome of the revolutionary war followed by the disintegration of numerous present-day national monuments, were used in the trailer. Subtle, huh? However, the movie doesn’t follow through with this question, since it would probably have a thousand answers. George Bailey-ing America in the actual movie would have been a task of such imaginative conjecture far beyond the already simplistic views of D’Souza and his collaborator, John Sullivan.
The documentary focuses on communicating current conservative anxieties, and I have to hand it to D’Souza for being a very persuasive voice. He’s a calm, well-mannered and seemingly rational commentator who appears to be listening to people like Noam Chomsky and several other rivals who hold understandable criticisms of our country’s legacy. D’Souza, with intelligent pacing and professionally shot (yet still generic looking) historical reenactments, responds to these criticisms by exonerating a history of slavery, land stealing, colonialism and inequality through arguments which attempt to correct the claims of historian Howard Zinn. To say that during some parts, I felt persuaded to entertain some of D’Souza’s ideas should be a compliment to him.
Eventually, with immaturity, he continues his attack on the Obama administration while demonizing famed community organizer Saul Alinsky and his evil influence over Hillary Clinton. Like in his last film, D’Souza has a McCarthyism-level preoccupation with uncovering past notorious affiliates of those he wishes to smear.
He concludes that cynical perspectives of the USA are part of a strategy, influenced by the liberal radicals in charge, to undermine our country’s strength and destroy the American Dream. The ultimate insult I took from this film was not in its stance that America’s faults have been corrected throughout the centuries, but that it doesn’t want to give credit to the leftist radicalism, which made these changes possible. As a citizen of this strong nation, I want to do what I can to preserve its ideals, but the notion that my reservations regarding American supremacy should be viewed as part of our national decline is absurd. It is possible to be a good student who doesn’t enjoy a pep rally?
The new class warfare-themed allegorical science-fiction film, “Snowpiercer,” is far away from the messages of D’Souza. Korean director Bong Joon-ho’s (“Memories of Murder” and “The Host”) first English-language film is a dark, surreal nightmare brought to the big screen with a morbid imaginary vision similar to the works of Terry Gilliam (for “Brazil” and “12 Monkeys”) and Jean-Pierre Jeunet (for “Delicatessen”).
It takes place in a near-future world where the backfiring of a scientific solution for global warming has left the planet in a new ice age. The only living survivors have been aboard a long, fast-moving train for 17 years. Chris Evans takes a break from being Captain America to play a disgruntled revolutionary leader among the train’s rear-car impoverished passengers. As he succeeds in raiding one car after another, the movie becomes delightfully more bizarre.
A decade ago, when theatrical releases found a bigger college-age audience, a film like “Snowpiercer” would have found wider distribution. Now that the movies are domestically dependent on adolescent boys, a savagely “R”-rated thinking-man’s dystopian film is as endangered as the film’s characters.
The international cast also includes John Hurt, Octavia Spencer, Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell and Alison Pill, as well as two actors from previous Bong films, Song Kang-ho and Ko Ah-sung. This director continues to be good with ensembles, and what better a project than one this claustrophobic work? Every car through which the heroes advance seems like a different world, preserving ways of life that make no sense in post-apocalyptic conditions.
This movie may not sound realistic, and it isn’t. This is an abstract vision where disbelief is to be suspended if you want to get on board with the insanity of this train. This movie bothered me in a good way. In spite of its graphic violence, its ideas are the source of its unsettling power. Based on a French graphic novel, Bong adapts the material in a balancing act between the terrifying and the whimsically absurd. He’s made a bold piece of unforgettable sci-fi cinema.
Bennett Duckworth is a film fanatic who lives in Louisville and goes to see a movie in the theater at least once a week. He has kept a movie review blog since September of 2011 with the mission of writing about every new release he sees, as well as new trends in filmmaking and classic films he loves. You can read more of his reviews at www.bennettduckworth.blogspot.com.