Weekend Box Office: Hilarious “American Carol” vs. Bigoted, Atheist, Moral Equivalence “Religulous”
I was shocked with how good it is. I expected it to me stupid, since conservatives aren’t known for their sense of humor and most attempts come off as stupid exercises in ideology. But this wasn’t that. It was hilarious. Yes, some of the jokes and gags were stupid, but most weren’t. I found myself laughing in humor—and also in agreement—with this movie more than I do many mainstream major movie comedies.
The plot: It’s the Fourth of July, and a goofy grandfather, Leslie Nielsen, is telling his grandchildren a fairy tale about the grinch who stole Independence Day. Only it’s not a grinch. It’s Michael Moore, er … “Michael Malone.” And it’s a true story, not a fairy tale.
Moore/Malone wants to eliminate the Fourth of July and has enlisted a number of liberal groups to do it with him. Meanwhile, Islamic terrorists want to recruit Moore to do a terrorist movie for them, to make it easier to recruit jihadists. Moore’s nephew is in the military and wants Uncle Mike to understand why what he’s doing is harming America. It takes three ghosts of characters past—John F. Kennedy, General George S. Patton, and George Washington—to teach Michael Moore, er … “Malone” a lesson. Yes, it’s a take-off of Scrooge or “It’s a Wonderful Life.”
There are so many funny, oh-yeah, yes-yes-yes! moments in this movie, I laughed out loud a lot and so did the other people in the theater.
Surprisingly, a lot of B-list celebs made cameos in the movie, in addition to the starring role played by Kelsey Grammer (Gen. Patton). The list includes Paris Hilton, Kevin Sorbo, Gary Coleman, David Alan Grier, Jon Voight, James Woods, and Dennis Hopper (thought he was a big lib, but I guess I’m wrong).
The movie does a great job of skewering everything from ACLU lawyers to Rosie O’Donnell (the actress playing her is a dead-ringer and spot on) to moveon.org to Hollywood … and, of course, Michael Moore and his “Sicko” documentary. The best two parts are when Rosie O’Donnell shows a documentary about radical Christian terrorists on the “O