American Dreamz (2006)
Directed by Paul Weitz
Written by Paul Weitz
Starring Hugh Grant, Dennis Quaid, Marcia Gay Harden, Mandy Moore, Willem Dafoe, Chris Klein
Release Date April 21st, 2006
Published April 20th, 2006
When I heard that the very talented writer-director of American Pie and About A Boy, Paul Weitz, had decided to take on an ambitious satire of President George W. Bush and the vapid karaoke extravaganza American Idol, I was quite excited. Two such broad targets are, no doubt, hard to miss with hard edged satire. So how disappointed was I when, while finally watching American Dreamz, that Weitz manages to miss the target like a Buffalo Bills kicker in the Super Bowl.
Hugh Grant stars in American Dreamz as Martin Tweed a Simon Cowell clone with a nasty disposition on screen and off. A self loathing jerk, we meet Martin as he dumps his girlfriend while celebrating his shows latest spectacular ratings.
The new season of 'American Dreamz' is about to begin and a new crop of contestants are lining up. In the tiny hamlet of of Padookie, Ohio Sally Kendoo (Mandy Moore) is ready for her closeup. An ambitious, plotting, self absorbed teen, Sally celebrates her American Dreamz birth by dumping her dopey but loving boyfriend William (Chris Klein). So broken up about it William runs off to the army and is immediately sent to Iraq.
On the other side of the world Omer (Sam Galzari) is training in an Al Quaeda terrorist camp. However, he spends his evenings singing along to show tunes. He is soon sent to America to live with relatives and finds himself auditioning for American Dreamz, the producers, Tweed and flunkies played by Judi Greer and John Cho, have decided the key to ratings is diversity. They want an arab guy and they choose Omer opposite him they want a jewish guy and they get a hasidic rapper played by Adam Busch.
Running parallel to the American Dreamz story is that of President Jack Staton (Dennis Quaid). Having just narrowly won re-election, President Staton wakes up one morning and decides to read the newspaper instead of his daily briefing. He then proceeds to not leave the presidential bedroom for three solid weeks, choosing to stay in bed reading the newspaper.
To get the president back on his feet his chief of staff (Willem Dafoe in a Dick Chaney haircut) gets the president an appearance as a guest judge on American Dreamz. This places the small town witch, the Arab dreamer and the dimwit president on a collision course, unfortunately the only collision is with indifference.
American Dreamz walks up to the edge of hard satire and then runs away like a scared child. The film does not have a mean bone in it's body despite attempts to look mean. Grant's Simon Cowell may be a self loathing prick but Grant cannot turn off that natural charisma that makes even a bastard like Martin Tweed charming. He's supposed to be a Machiavellian bastard but the edges are worn off and his manipulations never take away from his likability.
Mandy Moore is supposed to be Martin's equal in terms of self involvement and angry ambition but she too cannot turn off the charms that have made her a star. Moore evinces hateful bitchiness, but in an ill-conceived romantic subplot with Grant, she turns cuddly in a dark comic way and you can't help rooting. a little, for an unearned happy ending.
The characters in American Dreamz break down into two categories, either mean or or dopey. Grant, Moore and Dafoe fall into the mean category while Golzari, Klein and Quaid are in the dopey category. In a satire with sharp edges, with a clearer perspective and point of view, this might not be such a bad thing. But in an unfocused mess like American Dreamz you are left to wonder just what are you supposed to enjoy about these characters.
Weitz aspires at once to the hard edges of Kubrick's trenchant Doctor Strangelove and Christopher Guest's gentle prodding Waiting For Guffman and Best In Show. The mix is weak kneed when it needs to be edgy, as in the too soft take on the President, and to edgy when it needs to be soft as in the American Idol satire.
The saddest thing about American Dreamz is that Weitz's approach could have worked. If he had approached the Presidential satire like Kubrick did Strangelove and the American Idol stuff like Guest took on folkies in A Mighty Wind, then American Dreamz might have mixed these two disparate subjects in a satifying way.
Instead what we have is a complete disaster of weak willed satire, dopey hateful characters and rare moments of laughter. American Dreamz is one of the most disappointing films I've seen in a very long while. The very talented Paul Weitz has many more good films in his future, let's hope he puts this one behind him quickly.
