Director: David Gordon Green; Starring: Sandra Bullock; Billy Bob Thornton
B-/C- (Enjoyable while watching, but could have been made to deeper, better effect)
A Bolivian candidate for president hires an American media firm to help run his campaign, and they bring in an brilliant, unconventional consultant to vault him to the top of the polls.
Funny title, seeing as how Sandra Bullock is quite the brand herself. Want a heroine who’s plucky yet clumsy, single-minded yet frazzled, dedicated yet deprecating as she engages with problems in a high-stakes occupation? Bullock’s the Coca-Cola of that casting choice.
But can a diet of Coke sustain a movie where media manipulation meets social upheaval? It’s better at energizing the former than the latter. The dynamic events of the campaign deliver a rush of details: whiplash momentum changes, sly political judo, and quotes on strategy from Sun Tzu to Lyndon Johnson. Bullock does well in getting the audience to follow her along and pick up on the basic tools of media chicanery. (Speaking of tools, she gets no help from the many other members of her team, who are soon reduced to simply reacting aghast at whatever she comes up with. If this was a cop movie it would be like there’s five loudmouth captains all asking for her badge.) She’s better served when she faces off against Billy Bob Thornton’s rival consultant; her reactions to his smug sliminess are quite funny and satisfying.
The movie becomes less satisfying, however, the more it looks at the country’s social situation. There’s an earnestness towards its sympathies of the populace’s plights that doesn’t mix at all with the frothy cynicism of its campaign gamesmanship. Worse, the way the movie tries to pivot to this earnest viewpoint goes all sorts of wrong: it’s a jarring, contrived, and ultimately dishonest change of outlook. In a country that was facing such struggles for jobs and food, it’s not that fulfilling or enjoyable to see Bullock having her cake and eating it too.
Scattered Reflections on Cinematic Projections 