2016: Obama's America - Movie Review

Produced by Gerald Molen, written and starring Dinesh D'Souza.

2016: Obama's America is a well-made documentary exploring Obama's history, and which asks the following question "Who were Barack Obama's forefathers?" This is a question that was not answered to any degree before Barack Obama's election in 2008 (though there were those who tried to sound the call). Voters were so eager for "hope and change" and so eager to elect the first nonwhite president that they didn't look at or care about his radical background - a background steeped in Marxist, socialist, anticolonial, anticapitalist, anti-Israel, and anti-America ideologies. Some pundits say that the background and history of the candidate (or president) shouldn't be delved into like this. That it's unpatriotic. What?? A person's past and his background are predictors of his future actions. Not always of course, but more often than not for sure.

The early moments of 2016: Obama's America tell Dinesh D'souza's history, which he points out is very similar to Barack Obama's history. They are born the same year, they graduated college the same year, they both went to an Ivy League college, they both were married the same year, and they both grew up in impoverished third-world countries where anticolonialism is prevalent.

2016 then takes the viewer to Africa, the home of Obama's father, his forefathers, and much of his family. Here we learn story of Obama's visit to Kenya after the death of his father and we meet at least one of his relatives. D'Souza spoke to Obama's half brother George Obama, who wrote a book in 2010 despite having only finished the 7th grade. D'Souza asks George Obama if he thinks his brother Barack should help him in some way. George suggests pridefully that he is a grown man and can help himself. Incidentally, the two met in a park, so obviously George did not want to have his home on film, which Dinesh suggests is very small. My question is, the president's brother wrote a book and he still lives in a hut?

Indonesia was also visited by D'Souza and the film crew. Barack Obama (Barry Soetoro at the time) spent a portion of his childhood growing up there, going to a Muslim school as an Indonesian citizen, and according to the president's book, eating dog. Hawaii was also a backdrop for some of the film.

2016 uncovers, as much as any documentary can with this secretive person, the president's background and shows who his father and mother were, shows who his mentors and teachers were, and shows the company Barack Obama kept himself immersed in, all of which reveal that he is no garden-variety Democrat or liberal but rather that he has an extremely left-of-center philosophy founded upon anticolonialism, and anticapitalism.

The film points out that everything that President Obama is doing is purposeful and are not just bumbling attempts at doing what is right for the country. His spending and increases in debt are meant to weaken America's position in the world, the economic stimulus was meant to hobble the economy, and his giveaways to other countries are meant to spread the U.S. wealth.

The film also asks and attempts to answer another question, "If Obama wins a second term, where will we be in 2016?" According to the film and the experts that D'Souza speaks to, America will be further down the road to socialism, it will be further diminished as a world power, even to the point where it will be vulnerable and unable to deter wars anywhere in the world. The wealth of individual citizens will continue to decrease as well as the country's wealth on the whole.

David M. Walker, who served as United States Comptroller General, had some sobering things to say about the debt and deficit suggesting that we are fast heading down the road of Greece and Spain. When the debt is the same as the yearly GDP (Gross Domestic Product) or near it, I'd say he is right. (On a side note, I hope Mitt Romney appoints David Walker treasury secretary when he is elected.)

If you want to know more about Barack Obama, you will learn a lot about him from this documentary, much of which in fact is based upon Barack Obama's two autobiographies. D'Souza starts with facts he learns in those to build a foundation of knowledge about someone that he suggests is one of the most unknown people ever elected to the office of president.

2016: Obama's America is expanding its reach in theaters. Check for a theater near you.

D'Souza's book, Obama's America is an even more detailed look at the same subject matter and you can get it here: Obama's America: Unmaking the American Dream

Monumental - In Search of America's National Treasure -- Movie Review

I recently watched Monumental - In Search of America's National Treasure with my friend Rob. We were in a packed theater in North Brunswick, New Jersey on opening night participating in a live simulcast event hosted by Kirk Cameron (of the 1980s TV series, Growing Pains), who also narrates/stars in the historical documentary about America's founding. He invited the viewing audience into his home where a viewing party was going on with his friends, family, the makers of the film, and some VIPs like his grandfather who'd fought at Iwo Jima, his pastor, and a relative of Martin Luther King Jr. He also had some very good music lined up.

In the film, Kirk expresses worry about the cultural decay and the political direction that is affecting the United States in the early twenty-first century, and he is worried about the country we will be leaving to our children. The movie is meant to give the viewer some hope that all is not lost yet. Cameron hopes it will spark some action. The movie suggests that there is a path that we can follow, a path, Cameron says, that worked before.

Cameron travels to Europe, Boston, Plymouth, Washington and other places, tracing America's past, and discussing America's founding with several historians who set the record straight concerning the Pilgrims (the forefathers) and the Founding Fathers of the United States.

The movie addresses the liberal talking points about America's history. What we learn in grades K-12 and in college, as well as in the mainstream media, is often colored by the viewpoint that America is inherently a bad nation, full of bad people and bad leaders. Cameron and the producers of Monumental show that along with some bad there was plenty of good in America's past. Every nation and every people have good and bad in their past. It is inescapable because every group of humans has its "bad eggs", including the oft-portrayed-as-angel Native Americans. But the ideas that started America, starting with the Pilgrims and continuing on to the Founding Fathers in 1776 were rooted in good because they were rooted in God. The very reason the Pilgrims came to America was for religious freedom. Not to persecute the Indians. They were not Conquistadors. They weren't looking for gold. The Pilgrims tried to live in peace and harmony with their Native American neighbors.

The film goes on to state that the same is true of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. Twenty-seven of the signers were graduates with Christian seminary degrees. Most of them believed in God and all believed that founding a nation based on morals derived from Christianity was a good idea. Not a nation governed by a religion, but founded in partnership with its moral foundations. It was the founding documents and the foundation for justice that they provided which allowed racial and social justice to slowly but surely reign victorious.

I didn't care for some of the rough camera work by the cameraman and director at times (The bouncy, unsteady camera shots to me can be disorienting and motion sickness inducing.) but thankfully this didn't occur throughout the whole movie.

I had recently been to Plymouth Massachsetts and had seen the Mayflower 2, and the Pilgrim Museum, but unfortunately I missed out on the National Monument to the Forefathers which is the semi-focus of this movie. I wish I had seen it. It is impressive, in stature and in its conception. The monument, built in 1889, is hidden in a neighborhood near Plymouth and is an inspiring symbol of how this nation was formed. Monumental says that if we want to reform the nation, then the principles which this monument delineates will be how it must be done.

The historical documentary is a positive look at America's past and a hopeful look towards America's future. See it today, and if you can, see it with your kids so they can see America's past in a different light than is provided by the U.S. public school system.

Get more information about the film at the movie's Facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/monumentalmovie/monumentalmovie.

You can buy it here:  Monumental: In Search of America's National Treasure  

Source Code - Movie Review

Image copyright Summit Entertainment

Source Code is an exciting, interesting, emotion charged, and sometimes baffling movie. And considering that it is also a riveting whodunit thriller, I am surprised that the box office take isn’t larger than the approximately $36,000,000 (thru 4/18/11) it has garnered since April 1 when it opened in theaters across the U.S. I went to see it on Sunday afternoon and there were eight, maybe ten people in the small theater. I’m not complaining, because the fewer people in the small space we were in, the less distractions while the movie played. But as good as the film is, this didn’t seem like a fair-sized audience. Maybe the marketing of the movie is inadequate, though I do have to give kudos to the studio, who, besides making the standard trailers available for the film, also made available the first five minutes of the movie as a teaser on Yahoo’s movies website. The trailers, including the five minute one hooked me and I had to see the film. Source Code has even gotten many good critical and user reviews (including this one).

Jake Gyllenhaal, is terrific as Captain Colter Stevens, an Air Force helicopter pilot who wakes up in another man’s body on a doomed train headed for Chicago (doomed I tells ya). For a good portion of the movie he is trying to acclimate himself to his confusing situation and finds out a little here and a little there to keep the viewer interested in what is happening to the man. In the seat across from him on the commuter train is a friend of “his”, a woman named Christina who is played very well by Michelle Monaghan.

At the start of the movie, the viewer is made aware that Captain Stevens is apparently on a mission to find out who bombed a commuter train and thwart a possible nuclear dirty bomb attack on the city of Chicago. And there is time travel of a sort involved. The twists and turns of storyline as Stevens tries to figure out where the bomb is, who the bomber is, and what his own situation is, make the movie plenty exciting. The unhomogeneous cast of characters on the train adds a realistic flavor to everyday life in the suburbs of an American city.

If you have ever seen Groundhog Day then you’ll recognize the parallel with that movie almost immediately, but unlike Groundhog Day which beats you over the head with its plot gimmick, Source Code does not. In an interesting casting nod, Scott Bakula, who played a time traveler in Quantum Leap, is cast as the voice of Capt. Stevens’ father, though I didn’t realize it at the time and it doesn’t matter in terms of the movie, it is just a cool connection. 

What a great picture! If you’re going to see a movie in the next week or two, see this film!

Iron Man 2 - Two Times the Fun

Iron Man, of Marvel comics fame, is a cool super hero. His weapons and abilities are cool. His mask is cool. Even his colors are cool. He's an almost perfect super hero. Except when he's drunk. Just check your smell-tester at the theater door of the latest Iron Man movie. Well, if you're going to a movie in this genre, you probably know that ahead of time.

Iron Man 2 is a fun, gripping 2 hours and 15 minutes. It's a super hero movie, so it follows a certain formula, but it is one of the better of the genre thanks to Robert Downey Jr., and a crazy Mickey Rourke who shines in this film as a Russian mad scientist villain. Throw in Samuel L. Jackson and Don Cheadle and Iron Man 2 rocks. Iron Man 2's well-done special effects also lend excitement and reality to the movie. The fight scenes and the "comic book" technology are awesome.

Robert Downey Jr.'s acting reminds me a bit of Mel Gibson's acting -- intense and quirky. The character he portrays, Howard Stark, aka Iron Man, is sort of a hyper-eccentric, and humorous Bruce Wayne. I really enjoy Downey Jr.'s acting (see Sherlock Holmes) and he doesn't disappoint here.

I'd never cared too much for Mickey Rourke, but I liked the way he portrayed his character, Ivan Vanko, in this film, Whiplash -- a great villain, and well acted by Rourke.

Gwyneth Paltrow's role could have been played by any actress and she really didn't stand out as Pepper Potts, Iron Man's executive assistant, CEO, and "love interest?"

Sam Rockwell who played Howard Stark's business nemesis seemed to me to be miscast as well. The role needed someone with more screen presence. However, it didn't detract from the movie on the whole.

I would definitely see this again and will buy the Blu-Ray disc or DVD when it comes out. Go see it.

7.7 out of 10 stars.

Couples Retreat Movie Review

If you're up for a funny movie (and who isn't these days?) then Couples Retreat with Vince Vaughn, Jason Bateman and many other great and talented actors is for you. It's a light-hearted look at problem resolution in marital relationships. It doesn't offer real solutions, but it does offer real laughs. The movie is set in the Caribbean and centers around four couples who go to an all-inclusive resort that promises to help them work out their problems. The humor is sometimes raunchy and always wacky. (The movie is rated PG-13, but I rate it PG-16 for simulated sexual activity and references.)

I love this movie and am definitely going to add the DVD to my collection when it comes out. Grab a friend or significant other and see this fun romp in the sun and sand.