If you like your satire obvious and your states blue, you'll love American Dreamz. Picture a country where a bumbling Commander in Chief sees his term in office as a mandate from God and a contest for pop superstardom is tops on television. Swap Bush for a vaguely southern Dennis Quaid and Simon Cowell for the growing- less-sexy-by-the-hour Hugh Grant, and you've got Paul Weitz's latest film.
When Quaid's President Staton starts reading the newspapers and reconsidering his politics, his staff pushes him into hosting American Dreamz, the movie's version of American Idol, as a PR stunt. Meanwhile, the show itself is seeking to diversify by casting an Arab. Enter terrorist-cum-crooner Omer (Sam Golzari). Mandy Moore also stars as a wannabe pop princess, and despite her real-life bubblegum roots, she's unconvincing in the role. As her Iraqi war veteran boyfriend, Chris Klein proves he should have stopped his satire career with Election. Tony Yalda provides some humor, if offensively so, as Omer's "Queer Eye for the Arab Guy."
There's something to be said for attempting to use film as a vehicle for social criticism, but one gets the feeling that Weitz was just being lazy: the movie's plot doesn't so much insightfully parallel America's current situation as completely rip it off. War in Iraq and scary terrorist cells? Check. References to the president's boozy past and nepotistic political rise? Check. A calculating baldy engineering the president's every move? Check (Willem Dafoe plays the Cheney knock-off). See the movie if your curiosity gets the better of you, but a couple hours watching CNN and FOX should provide the same effect, for free.
