[postlink]https://plythroug.blogspot.com/2012/06/movie-review-god-bless-america.html[/postlink]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEFj0Pngu_Eendofvid [starttext]
Movie Review: God Bless America
Opening on a pitch-black fantasy of a wailing baby being thrown in the air and shot down like a skeet target, comedian-turned-filmmaker Bobcat Goldthwait pays blunt warning in the opening minutes of God Bless America – his screed against the tendencies toward cruelty and narcissism in modern American culture. Those easily offended would do well to stay away from this extreme (and extremely funny) cathartic revenge film with a surprising amount of heart at its center. Like Mike Judge’s underrated Idiocracy, Goldthwait’s film may have paltry production values, but needs to be seen by the very airheads it mercilessly mocks (and then dispatches in a hail of fairly explicit gunfire).
Middle-aged, divorced office drone Frank (Joel Murray, brother of Bill and known for his work on Mad Men and Shameless) cannot tolerate any more of the braying contestants on an American Idol-style competition or the privileged brats on another channel demanding the world for their “Sweet 16.” He harbors desires to see them all wiped from the earth while impotently watching television or recoiling from his co-workers constant chatter about Lindsay Lohan or Brad Pitt’s personal lives. Murray’s constant deadpan voice-over lets us into Frank’s bitter commentary (not unlike Jack’s mocking narration in Fight Club). After Frank is diagnosed with a terminal illness, his suicidal despair leads to the actual murder of one of those loathed reality stars and her family. His “Tyler Durden” urging him to go further is an equally fed-up adolescent girl called Roxy (Tara Lynne Barr stealing the show with more than a little of Christina Ricci’s old bite). An abnormal but sweet bond formed, the two head out on a killing spree – targeting only the rudest amongst us – whether it be the guy taking up two parking spaces or a bunch of cell-phone drones in a movie theater, Goldthwait aims for small potato targets but the point is made that we are a culture in self-obsessed decline.
[endtext]
Movie Review: God Bless America
Opening on a pitch-black fantasy of a wailing baby being thrown in the air and shot down like a skeet target, comedian-turned-filmmaker Bobcat Goldthwait pays blunt warning in the opening minutes of God Bless America – his screed against the tendencies toward cruelty and narcissism in modern American culture. Those easily offended would do well to stay away from this extreme (and extremely funny) cathartic revenge film with a surprising amount of heart at its center. Like Mike Judge’s underrated Idiocracy, Goldthwait’s film may have paltry production values, but needs to be seen by the very airheads it mercilessly mocks (and then dispatches in a hail of fairly explicit gunfire).
Middle-aged, divorced office drone Frank (Joel Murray, brother of Bill and known for his work on Mad Men and Shameless) cannot tolerate any more of the braying contestants on an American Idol-style competition or the privileged brats on another channel demanding the world for their “Sweet 16.” He harbors desires to see them all wiped from the earth while impotently watching television or recoiling from his co-workers constant chatter about Lindsay Lohan or Brad Pitt’s personal lives. Murray’s constant deadpan voice-over lets us into Frank’s bitter commentary (not unlike Jack’s mocking narration in Fight Club). After Frank is diagnosed with a terminal illness, his suicidal despair leads to the actual murder of one of those loathed reality stars and her family. His “Tyler Durden” urging him to go further is an equally fed-up adolescent girl called Roxy (Tara Lynne Barr stealing the show with more than a little of Christina Ricci’s old bite). An abnormal but sweet bond formed, the two head out on a killing spree – targeting only the rudest amongst us – whether it be the guy taking up two parking spaces or a bunch of cell-phone drones in a movie theater, Goldthwait aims for small potato targets but the point is made that we are a culture in self-obsessed decline.
[endtext]
0 comments:
Post a Comment