Today was a travel day so I spent the morning in bed watching a movie with Teresa. We watched “Man of the Year”. Ehhh, it should have been better.
Political comic has a large following for his television show. He is jokingly asked to run for President. The idea gains momentum and he decides to grab some headlines and run. As the election gets closer he becomes serious and drops the comedy for a more serious ‘issues related’ approach. He gains the attention of everyone now, not just his followers. At the last debate, he breaks out and can’t hold the frustration anymore. He comes unglued and lashes out at both “legitimate” candidates. The press is distraught but also refreshed by his honesty. Through a computer error, the comic wins the election.
Now we have the computer programmer who knows something is wrong. She confronts her boss and is told to shut up or we’ll end up going out of business. She backs off but the boss has her set up on drug charges to discredit and fire her. Somehow she still maintains her computer access and finally discovers the glitch. The comic did not really win the election. She gets to the new President-elect and eventually tells him the truth (but only after they are starting to fall in love). The company is stalking and attacking the woman making her appear crazier and crazier. The big moment comes when he is meeting with the out-going President and sitting behind the desk. He realizes he has made a mockery of the office and he gets another call from the programmer chick telling him they are still after her, trying to kill her. There is a ring of truth is what she says and he believes her. He goes on SNL as planned but he uses the opportunity to announce that the election results were flawed and that he will not be involved in the re-election. The current president is re-elected and the comedian returns to his show, more popular than ever and the company thugs go to jail.
It was alright. Lewis Black, Jon Stewart, Jay Leno, whoever… It could have been any of them. There have been many times when I’ve thought that any one of these guys would be better in the role of President than the actual President. Lewis Black dropped the greatest line of the movie. When talking about how television makes everything seem credible but also makes everything seem bland. He says about the comic, “Yeah, they can hear him because he sounds different”. Yeah, anyone loud enough and different enough will get all the attention, deservedly so or not. The movie starts with Christopher Walken in a wheelchair narrating the story. When we start the movie proper, Walken’s character hasn’t had the heart-attack yet so I was watching for him to do his dance (Christopher Walken dances in every movie he’s in) before he ends up in the chair. So the heart attack happens and now I’m upset because I must have missed the dance. During the ‘wrap up’ scene it shows him tapping his feet and dancing while sitting in the chair. I was so happy to see that. I was afraid I missed it; it became the whole reason I watched the rest of the movie.
I normally love “average guy gets political power” type movies like “Dave” and “Mr. Smith” but this movie wasn’t enough to carry my attention through it. It felt like I was watching a comedy about a comic becoming president while simultaneously watching a suspense thriller like “The Net” or “Enemy of the State”. Neither of these story lines was advanced enough to really make them good. First, a major electronics company setting up and firing a person but forgetting to terminate their access to their internal network!? Shit, when I was laid off from WorldCom, I lost my access before I was told I was laid off. I tried to check my e-mail and couldn’t hit the servers. That’s when I knew I had been cut. Don’t tell me this company went through all the trouble of injecting this woman with a drug cocktail and chasing her across the country but never turned off her access. It’s just too unbelievable. More unbelievable than Jon Stewart being President.
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