God Bless America

Have you ever been frustrated with the world around you? Have you ever turned on your television set and grew tired of the unintelligent, poorly-written, and exploitative nature of reality television? Have you grown frustrated with how people around you prioritize the kinds of things they discuss? Or are you tired of people going immediately for the shocking and the offensive simply to get a reaction or stay relevant? Or how rude, inconsiderate people go about their day-to-day lives, inconveniencing other people with utter selfishness? Is the world a dark, lonely, and empty place that you find yourself sick of? If so, this movie may be for you.


It is important to note that the above statements are what the film would have you believe American life is like. The movie stars Joel Murray as the nihilistic and terminally ill Frank, and his co-star is the peppy, over-eager and bloodthirsty Roxy, played by Tara Lynne Barr. The movie is a dark comedy that satirizes the American way of life whilst at the same time pushing its own world-view of how things should be.

Satire is a very challenging thing to write. When executed well, you can have a humorous and thought-provoking analysis of whatever the subject matter may be. You can find a lot of examples of good satire out there: the late Mr. Show, Monty Python, the list goes on. The important part about writing good satire is that there has to be some degree of subtlety. Execution is everything, and in the case of God Bless America...it falls short. The traits of people that the movie is making fun of is easily enough to notice – perhaps too easy – and it can deliver laughs at times. The dialogue is written fairly well and there are some very funny moments within the story.

Where everything falls apart though, is in characterization. The longer the films go on the more they begin to degenerate into mouthpieces for the creators and not actual fully realized people with any depth. Now this would be fine if the film stuck to this. You can have a story where the main characters are just there to voice strong opinions so long as it is consistent. While the movie tries to be consistent in doing this, it falls short because of the character it tries to give the two main protagonists. Frank's arc with his illness and facing his mortality go absolutely nowhere. It serves as a very long set-up to a very poorly executed joke. Roxy's arch is non-existent. She is a character of pure self-indulgence and pandering. There is a big reveal about her background that comes later in the movie, but I doubt anyone will care when it happens. The explanation enough substance to balance the extremity of her actions throughout the movie and therefore feels lazy and uninspired.

By the end of the movie's run-time we find our main protagonists pulled out of any kind of story or development and into full proselytizing mode. It is as if the writer took a line from Mr. Torgue(skip to a 1:04) instead of actually developing his characters. The worst part about this whole venture is that there are several missed opportunities here. For example, there is one scene between Frank and Roxy where they are talking about their dislikes and likes in a hotel room, and there are several points which could have caused some interesting tension between the two. Another comes when Roxy finds out that Frank agrees with the politics of one of their targets, even when she herself does not.

Had they developed the characters more, or had they focused simply on the satire and kept the characters as mouthpieces, the film would have been more enjoyable. However, flip-flopping between amalgamations of both just simply doesn't work. The characters aren't deep enough to be compelling, the satire isn't funny enough to justify its mean-spirited nature, and the whole endeavor falls short of what it could have been.

As an aside, there are a LOT of driving montages. I'm not even kidding.

Worth a watch, but only one.

Rating: 2 out of 5.