God Bless America

"Thanks for not talking during the feature."

"Nobody has any shame anymore, and we're supposed to celebrate it. I saw a woman throw a used tampon at another woman last night on network television. A network that bills itself as 'Today's Woman's Channel.' Kids beat each other blind and post it YouTube. I mean, you remember when eating rats and maggots on Survivor was shocking? It all seems so quaint now. I'm sure the girls from Two Girls One Cup will have their own dating show on VH1 now. Why have a civilization anymore if we are no longer interested in being civilized."

These are words spoken by Frank (Joel Murray) to his co-worker right before his boss fires him for sending flowers to the receptionist's house. Joel Murray, if you do not recognize by name, is best known for his character Fred Rumsen on Mad Men, Danny Fitzsimmons on Still Standing, and Eddie Jackson on Shameless. He is an actor never much put in the spotlight, at least not that I've seen, but here he creates a subtle, subdued portrait of a depressed man on the brink of insanity.

The film opens with Frank pontificating about his hatred for a great number of people; his neighbors, their infant child (who he describes as "some kind of nocturnal civil defense air raid siren that goes off every fucking night like it's Pearl Harbor"), the "celebrities" on reality TV shows - the list goes on. Within the first two minutes of the film, we witness the murder of his neighbors (and infant child) at the receiving end of Frank's shotgun. This is fantasy. At least, for now.

Frank is divorced. His daughter, perhaps 10 or 11 years old, doesn't want to spend time with him. Not to mention, she's a spoiled brat, exclaiming to her mother, "I hate you! You got me a Blackberry and I wanted an iPhone!" His ex-wife isn't particularly cordial. He loses his job in an absurd series of circumstances. And to top it off, discovers he has an incurable brain tumor. What does he decide to do? Well, while watching one of those reality shows where a spoiled teenager bitches because her parents give her a Lexus instead of the Cadillac Escalade she wanted, he decides to murder her. And so he does. One of her classmates, Roxy (Tara Lynne Barr) witnesses the murder, and immediately responds with "awesome!" Barr, whom I did not recognize, has apparently appeared in a number of television and film roles (such as Drake and Josh), none of which I have seen. Here, she brings a kind of exuberant energy to the role and completely makes it her own. She too, decides that many people are stupid, and therefore should die. So she joins Frank in his killing spree.

From this point forward, the film becomes a splendid synthesis of Bonnie & Clyde and Natural Born Killers. It has not the perfection of the former, nor the over-the-top energy of the latter, but it bears many similarities. 

In one of my favorite scenes, Roxy and Frank, in a motel room, discuss everybody that they hate. Oskar Schindler wrote a list of roughly 1,000 individuals. Roxy and Frank's list of people and groups they hate could put that number to shame. Roxy wants to kill them all. Frank insists - "we only kill people that deserve it." Do any of these victims deserve death? Certainly not, and the film realizes it. That's why I watched this movie with a gleeful smile on my face. It's a dark, comedic, satiric poke at the current state of political and cultural affairs in this country. And anybody who rolls their eyes at the Kardashians, or the Jersey Shore, will find some level of entertainment in this. The key is to recognize that this film doesn't glorify murder or violence; it simply uses it as a tool for a bigger statement. This is a movie. Not reality.

After a hilarious, brilliant, ADD monologue about the magnificent of Alice Cooper, Frank jokingly refers to Roxy as "Juno." She doesn't like this: "Don't ever call me Juno again... that's who we should kill next!" "A fictional character?" "No, Diablo Cody!"

In another wonderful exchange, Roxy suggests murdering the cast of Glee. Frank asks, "What's wrong with Glee?" "It stereotypes and homogenizes homosexuals. Plus it ruined Rocky Horror forever." She also proclaims "Our prime directive is to interfere with the cultural evolution of a pre-warped civilization." Roxy is a smart girl, if not deranged.

The film builds to its inevitable climax, which I shall not describe, but you may suspect it early in the film, when Roxy buys a hat for Frank, as I did.

I recommend this as a fantastic work of dark satire; a film not to be taken seriously, but a film to be entertained by. Its violence, murder, and chaos is unwarranted and over-the-top in reality. But, let me reiterate, this is a movie. *Not* reality.

"Who am I? I'm Frank. But that doesn't matter. Question is, who are you? America has become a cruel, vicious place. We reward the dumbest, the shallowest, the meanest, and the loudest. No longer have we any common sense. No decency. No sense of shame. No right or wrong. The worst qualities in people are looked up to...celebrated. Lying, spreading fear is fine, as long as you make money doing it. We've become a nation of slogan-saying, vile-spewing hate-mongers. We've lost our kindness. We've lost our soul."

***1/2