First, there was the little zephyr, "That's My Bush!" on TV. The right wing did not like the series, of course, and it seemed unfair at the time.

Probably was unfair, at the time.

For one thing, it was inconsequential, a spoof of Presidential buffoonery, but now up to nearly 70 percent of Americans have learned that, though he may be limited in his attention span and his vision for human kind, George W. Bush is not stupid. He's just well-focused . . . not on our well being, but upon the interests of his narrow class.

Then, as the evidence of blunders, incompetence, corruption, imperial hubris and plain totalitarianism mounted against the Bush Administration, especially in regard to the trillion dollar unnecessary "attack on Iraq" and its aftermath, that old bleep-disturber Director Joe Dante [GREMLINS] slipped "Homecoming" into last season's Showtime Master's of Horror series. (All about the bodies of American Iraq War dead rising up and marching like zombies on the White House, a la Abel Gance's J'ACCUSE or W.W. Jacobs' "The Monkey's Paw."] But the right wing, if they watched it, didn't react much.

["Homecoming" is out on DVD this Summer.]

Now begins the deluge, the Flood: Shortly will appear the first American theatrical frontal assault on the obscene absurdity we are all part of in allowing the Bush Administration to enter office twice, and watching it prepare to take us to war for a third time without a formal Congressional Declaration.

The picture is called AMERICAN DREAMZ.

And AMERICAN DREAMZ, for all it relevance and comprehensiveness, is a watery, seldom edgy comedy/satire!

I hesitate to say, if we do not heed the film's underlying message, it's "the Fire next time" for us.

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AMERICAN DREAMZ is the latest examination of our modern customs by Writer/Director Paul Weitz (AMERICAN PIE, 1999; ABOUT A BOY, 2002; IN GOOD COMPANY, 2004). The film divides into four manageable threads which intertwine at its climax. For a theme, AMERICAN DREAMZ develops the idea, both humorously and in more serious terms, that almost everyone from the President of the United States to Arab terrorists are such prisoners of obsessive fantasies that she/he feels the need to be managed. It is as if a larger and larger segment of the World's population has gone megalomaniacally, homicidally or suicidally insane, and needs a charismatic keeper. We are tribal once again as in the days when the followers of Serapis, Jehovah and Jesus slaughtered each other in the name of the True God. Now when we are not killing each other we bet on football pools or play video games. The default manager, when a real one is not at hand, is a Television reality show, or dreams (and nightmares) of being on Television.

This state of mind lends itself to political and commercial manipulation.

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Because Weitz, son of Actress Susan Kohner (FREUD, 1962), grandson of Paul Kohner (legendary agent for Billy Wilder, John Huston) and Lupita Tovar (Mexican star of DRACULA, 1931), has a slow spark for comedy, his humor is heavier than might be ideal, and his ideas tend to be obvious. The viewer may think when he should be laughing, and laugh when he might be thinking:

Thread #1 -- AMERICAN DREAMZ gets off to a bafflingly bad start with the sudden appearance, before the titles, of Marty Tweedie (Hugh Grant), producer/host of Television's most successful reality show, staring over a pool in LA, as his wife [girlfriend?] slips up behind him to say that she is calling it quits. Since Tweedie is a sadomasochist, he welcomes the news. It affirms his own self-loathing, his belief that everyone is out to screw everyone else. It must be so because he proves it, Simon Cowell-American Idol-fashion, on his TV show, American Dreamz, to well over 100, 000, 000 Americans every week.

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Thread #2 -- A couple of thousand miles away, President Staton (Dennis Quaid), his faithful wife (Marcia Gay Harden) snoozing beside him, has awakened on the morning after his successful election to a second term, disturbed by an uncharacteristic attack of personal curiosity. Staton/Quaid, as an alter ego for George W. Bush, makes a troubled, perhaps fatal decision to actually send his butler out to find an instrument which has always turned him off: a daily newspaper. By the time Vice President Sutter (Willem Dafoe) arrives to give the President his morning briefing, Staton has begun to realize the horrible things done in his name, the incredible blunders which have all but ruined the United States of America, over the previous four years. The President is deeply puzzled and depressed.

"Do you know," he asks his Veep, poring over The Guardian, "that there are two -- no three -- kinds of Iraqistanis?"

[His wife has long known.]

"You mean, Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds?" replies the Vice President,

"You knew that?" exclaims the wide-eyed President.

He goes into a funk, reading furiously more papers like the British Guardian (which broke the Downing Street Memo story, proving Our Administration lied on WMD's to follow a predetermined plan to attack Iraq). The funk lasts for weeks, encouraging rumors and questioning from reporters that the President has "gone bonkers."

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Thread #3 -- Meanwhile, in Padookie, Ohio, beautiful blonde teenager, Sally Kendoo (Mandy Moore) and her hard-nosed, practical mother (Jennifer Coolidge) have discovered that Sally's application for a singing audition on American Dreamz has been accepted. The roving camera crew from the show are on the porch. Not long after, she throws over her dog-like boyfriend, William Williams (Chris Klein), because he will not be able to keep up with her now. He promptly joins the Army to go to Iraq.

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Thread #4 -- And across the World, in an al-Quaeda training camp, a young Arab named Omer (Sam Golzari) is showing an Osama look-alike that he is the least likely assassin to succeed. After a hard day failing test after test on the combat confidence course, risking the wrath of the Elders, his only solace is his mother's collection of American show tunes, which he dances to in his tent. But even there, he is found out, and is soon on his way to live with relatives in California, where he can't possibly do any more harm to himself, the Cause, or others of the faithful.

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Back at the White House, the First Lady has to feed the President
tranquilizers to provide him courage enough to leave his bed. Karl
Rove/Cheney-like Vice President Sutter has him adopt a new dog, brings Carmen Electra into the Oval Office for a photo opportunity, and in desperation, books him as a judge on the big American reality show, American Dreamz, to restore his confidence and put him
back in the limelight.

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William William goes to Iraq, after two weeks basic training, and is wounded (in the arm) on his first day patrolling "Indian Country." Sally Kendoo heads for LA, and Marty Tweedie recognizes in her a kindred potential sex partner so shallow that she re-awakens old drives in him that he thought were gone for good. The perfect frisson will be to have an Arab matched against wholesome-looking blonde Sally in the finals of the American Dreamz season. President Staton turns off his cartoons and begins to watch American Dreamz, too, in preparation for his introduction to real show biz.

It shall be done.

And somewhere in the Hindu Kush, Osama watching events on TV, realizes that Omer may soon be in the historic position at the ordained psychological moment. A trio of assassin handlers is dispatched to California.

It shall be done.

You can see where AMERICAN DREAMZ is going.

The picture mixes satire [several assassins become inured to American luxury], farce [William William suddenly proves useful as the war hero, offering Sally an engagement ring in the American Dreamz finale], social commentary [Omer's California Arab host family is more la-la-land than the home grown variety], and philosophy [Can a democracy so rich and so greedy survive?], etc.

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AMERICAN DREAMZ refreshingly takes everyone of its characters on; no one gets a pass. For instance, "Osama," in his blue turban, is shown hunkered down in his Tora Bora cave watching Amercan Dreamz as avidly as an American teenager or an over-the-hill wannabe (for a different purpose, of course).

On the downside, a lot of the jibes and comic bits don't work or are over-used. There may be too many American Idol look-alikes: The country singer, the black diva with the mouse-ear hair-do, the Israeli heart-throb who dresses like a rabbinical student but has a taste for black chicks. The movie tends to stop dead for the mostly familiar musical numbers, and that slows down the action.

The large cast works hard, however. Dennis Quaid and Marcia Gay Harden show us a typical stereotypical, almost lovable First Couple in the Bush mold. [For a more intimate portrait of the real George W. Bush, see Alexandra Pelosi's pre-election documentary, *JOURNEYS WITH GEORGE.] Hugh Grant trades on his reputation as a cad. Mandy Moore seems curiously right and energetic as the All-American Girl/peaches and cream schemer, with her blonde locks, full body and Cherokee coloring. Chris Klein, new to me, rings the changes from retro-hippie, to buzz-cut grunt, to demented war veteran. And English newcomer Sam Golarz, a Brendan Fraser clone, while poking fun at his character, makes Omer likable. He is particularly good at terrible renditions of "Luck Be a Lady Tonight," "Dream the Impossible Dream," "I Did It My Way" -- all at appropriate points in the plot.

Cinematographer Robert Elswit (SYRIANA; GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK) and Production Designer William Arnold (MAGNOLIA, 1999) are workman-like on the technical side of the production.

I give AMERICAN DREAMZ above average marks, if only because should even a few people coming to see it recognize in its foolishness the World we are creating, the picture will become an important one.

In other words, crazy comedies, even if they don't quite make it, may teach us as much or more about terror than "horror pictures" or the real horror pictures, the ones I so often review, the documentaries on the environmental, economic and political destruction of our World by the people now firmly in charge.

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I am reminded of an an excerpt from a column I noted the other day in my local newspaper:

Is "Fake" Violence Rotting Us From The Inside Out?

"Violence no longer informs me. It no longer has the power to teach. It is a one-note song I've heard so many times it has lost its power to stun or impress or delve deep. It now merely tears at the fabric of the soul, punches holes in the anima, scrapes its knuckles on the pavement of hate, and you can shrug and roll your eyes and go watch The Hills Have Eyes or Saw II or even play some hi-res shockingly ultraviolent video game and enjoy the brutal escapism and wallow in the bloodshed while pretending it's not slowly, quietly blackening your world view like a smoker sucking down another carton of Marlboro Reds, but deep down, where the meanings are, I think maybe, just maybe, you might be seriously mistaken." -- San Francisco Chronicle 03/15/06

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[In an incident of Life creeping up on Art, last Thursday, blonde beauty Jessica Simpson, star of THE DUKES OF HAZARD, and a "Pop Queen" of Mandy Moore's generation, refused to represent her Operation Smile charity at a President Bush GOP fundraiser. Her father, a minister, pointed out that, though Jessica "loved the heck" out of the President, she did not think her attendance at a partisan event was proper. Mary Carey, however, a porn star who ran against Arnold Schwartzenegger in the runoff for California Governor, attended the GOP event for a second year in a row. At a Karl Rove luncheon, she observed: “Wait till they see that I have lost 20 pounds since the last time they saw me. Watch out, Mr. President!”]

Comedy and satire have their purposes, as Preston Sturges knew when, during World War II, he wrote and directed THE GREAT MCGINTY (about American political corruption); THE MIRACLE OF MORGAN'S CREEK (a true blue All-American girl supports the troops by having sextuplets out of wedlock); and HAIL THE CONQUERING HERO (a draft dodger is mistaken for a war veteran). Each is a masterpiece of satire, and America was stronger for welcoming them all.

Give AMERICAN DREAMZ a chance, if not a break.

I should not like to see the Fire. You wouldn't either.

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For a Macresarf1 Review of *JOURNEYS WITH GEORGE, go to --

http://www.epinions.com/content_80194932356

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UPDATE: SUNDAY, JULY 30, 2006 -- Last Friday, July 28, 2006, in the midst of a worsening Middle Eastern situation concerning the Lebanese populace caught between two groups of sadistic bullies, Hezbollah and the Israelis, President George W. Bush took time away from an urgent visit about the matter by British Prime Minister Tony Blair, to welcome to the Oval Office . . . THE CAST OF TV'S "AMERICAN IDOL"!

Shades of AMERICAN DREAMZ (or nightmarez), who said, Life doesn't imitate Art?

Would it do Our President or us any good? I wondered. This morning, looking at all the mangled bodies of little Lebenese children coming over the Middle Eastern feed, and of enraged mobs knocking down the walls of the UN glass house in Beirut, I heard the grief-choked voices of the poverty-trapped victims.

"I don't think so." I said to the TV set. "What can we do to get the madmen in Washington out of the White House and Congress?" But the news commentators had no answers for me. Stay the course, they said. According to them, it was all Lebanon's, Syria's, and Iran's fault.

Do you begin to wonder, as I have for a long time?





Recommended:
Yes

Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older