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100As with the earlier movie, this one turns in on its own morality like a Möbius strip, endorsing kindness by practicing slaughter, and pulls us along for the ride. Detractors will call its reasoning ridiculous, and they'll be right - though I doubt that will bother Goldthwait, who makes a living being ridiculous.
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85God Bless America ends with a couple of tale-twisting bullet orgies designed to take your preconceptions, as well as your nerve-endings, by surprise.
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Jul 2, 201280Part road trip, part revenge movie, this is a tentative tale of a man who's not going to take it anymore, sharp on the fallibility of human foibles and sometimes stingingly funny, too.
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75The key point about God Bless America is that it's extreme but not exaggerated, a dark comedy that indulges - and questions - a violent, misanthropic fantasy about laying waste to the cultural landscape while staying grounded in a recognizable reality.
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75Writer/director Bobcat Goldthwait has an ax to grind and, once he's done grinding it, he uses it to split some skulls. God Bless America is many things - audacious, bitingly satirical, unafraid of venturing into uncomfortable territory - but it is never subtle.
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70This funny, sick twist of social satire is certainly locked and loaded, even if its aim is sometimes off.
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70You'll laugh and be offended, but if you watch it and don't want to be part of the solution, you'll know which side of the line you're on. Activism takes some unique forms.
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70It's a little too obvious -- interesting, sometimes kind of fun but, ultimately, not as satisfying as it might have been.
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67Offers a few laughs and a moment or two of drama, but it's finally more of a conceit -- and a familiar one -- than a film.
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60The good news: This is Goldthwait the writer-director, not Goldthwait the actor -- so there's no schticky voice to endure. But his exceedingly black comedy does speak loudly -- and it turns out he's actually got something worthwhile to say.
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50Although several great speeches and hilarious one-liners goose the film, God Bless America nevertheless peaks too early and becomes rather one-note.
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50Some of this vigilante-fantasy misbehavior is wickedly funny.
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May 11, 201250There are so many monologues about obnoxious behavior that they begin to lose their luster - something I'd never have thought possible.
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50At no point during the movie does it strike him that mass extermination might be classified as "rude." No, Frank has the courage of his convictions, which include the belief that most of America has already flushed itself down the toilet.
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50Mr. Goldthwait's screenplay is essentially a comedy act fleshed out with a story he doesn't try to make convincing.
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50Here is a film that begins with merciless comic savagery and descends into merely merciless savagery. But wow, what an opening.
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50Bobcat Goldthwait's new movie is a burlesque that turns into a harangue that turns into a rampage.
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50The interplay between Murray and Barr is closely and carefully handled, but when the monotonous squib-popping subsides, the movie is often static and talky, lapsing into criticism-hedging qualifications and anti-everything speechifying.
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50A niche theatrical run might draw fans of Goldthwait's previous work, this effort isn't likely to get as much help from critics as those sometimes did.
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50While it starts out well, Bobcat Goldthwait's black comedy struggles to maintain focus as it turns into a road trip of diminishing rewards in satirical and narrative terms.
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May 10, 201245God Bless America only wants to see the worst in people - in fact actively seeks it out in order to be disgusted, and that feels almost as bad as the behavior the film is critiquing.
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40As both a comedian and filmmaker, Bobcat Goldthwait ("Shakes the Clown") has carved out a valuable spot as an idiosyncratic instigator. But even fans may be disappointed at how swiftly he undermines its own message here.
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40It's Goldthwait's first misstep, a serious one. He's simply not the filmmaker to mount a fierce takedown of Kardashian culture, thorough though his script's rage is.
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38By wholeheartedly taking its main character's side instead of complicating or censuring his homicidal vigilante crusade, it proves inanely one-note and preachy.