You know a movie really stinks when you have to go to the Wikipedia in order to get an explanation of it. The only reason I picked up this flick was because of a fondness for movie parodies, but this movie fails on all accounts. Except for some funny scenes about Arab terrorists at the start and the boorishness of the main character, it's just not funny. If anything, it's boring, it's tedious and it's an hour and ten minutes too long. What it really is a potential defamation lawsuit in the works as it slanders director Michael Moore, attempts to legitimize Conservative beliefs and skewers American History to the extreme Far Right for no apparent reason. It is supposedly set to the plot of "A Christmas Carol," but there's so much Far Right exposition here that any plot to this madness disappears, much like "Disaster Movie" and "Epic Movie." The movie features a contentious character named Michael Malone whose only things in common with Michael Moore are glasses, a cap and being overweight. He is supposed to be Liberal but he's just clueless, grouchy and petulant. He is visited by three historical figures (Kennedy, Patton and Washington) to tell him about American History, and the actors playing those characters are pretty spot on, but their side of history paints the United States as a country meant to go to war with everyone else and itself and not much of anything else. It's supposed to be an attack on Liberals, Truth, Justice and the American Way, but it really comes off as a parody of Conservative beliefs. Cut fast to the end because there's not much of anything else except several pointless cameos from actors (ranging to Leslie Nielsen and Kelsey Grammar down to several D-Listers whose careers ended before this movie was made) and a lot of self-serving Conservative dogma. As it ends, Malone is still repugnant, unpleasant and obnoxious. The movie is pointless, a waste of time for the few talented actors in it and just a way too long attempt to rationalize extreme Far Right politics. The biggest problem is that it's aimed for such a small audience and meant more for a Direct-To-DVD distribution. When I think of this film being sent to movie theaters, I start laughing at the foolishness of anyone thinking this long character assassination buried by extreme political bias was meant to be anything resembling "entertaining comedy."
Review of An American Carol
