God Bless America

Synopsis: When he’s sacked from his job and told that he’s dying of cancer, Frank (Joel Murray) decides to go and murder the spoilt, entitled brat star of a reality show. Soon he finds himself with a devoted sidekick, Roxy (Tara Lynne Barr) and so the middle-aged, terminally ill man and his teenage offsider go on a Bonnie and Clyde-style rampage across the USA.

If you’re a chronic grump, God Bless America is one of the most satisfying films you’ll see this year. Beginning with a bloody massacre of annoying neighbours and culminating in the gunning down of everyone on the set of American Idol, this is a gloriously violent expression of frustration at the inanity of modern pop culture. Director Bobcat Goldthwaite calls it an ultraviolent plea for civility.

There’s a strong sense of old-fashioned values at play here. Early on Frank eulogises the art of conversation, of being nice to people, valuing other people. And then he’s sacked from his job for doing pretty much exactly that. Unfortunately, he sent flowers to the receptionist since she’d had a bad day. But he didn’t want to embarrass her so he looked up her address on the company database and sent them to her home. He’s completely oblivious to the possibility that this could be viewed as creepy. So he’s sacked for sexual harassment. And then he’s told he’s dying. Back home, he’s stuck watching reality TV as it’s all that’s served up and he needs something to block out the noise of his inane neighbours. But it’s all too much and he’s not gonna take it anymore.

God Bless America is wish-fulfillment cinema, and anyone who has ever been stuck in a cinema filled with people who refuse to be quiet is going to be grinning ear to ear at one particular scene. But there’s many others as well. It’s like someone has your shitlist and decided to prevent you doing something terrible happening by letting you vicariously engage in some restorative mayhem. Bobcat Goldthwaite is your therapist, and his film is his treatment for your ills. Thank him by paying to watch it in the cinema rather than downloading it off the internet and complaining on some message board that it has some structural problems in the narrative and that the pacing drops off a little bit towards the end. It does, but seriously, you know want to murder the news anchors of Fox News, the cast of Jersey Shore, and the executives behind every other reality TV show that lowers your IQ by its mere existence. Watch this and get it out of your system.

 

 

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