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‘America’: Dinesh D’Souza’s revisionist history America: Imagine the World Without Her *½ Rated PG-13 for violent images; starring featuring Dinesh D’Souza, John Koopman, Ted Cruz; written and directed by Dinesh D’Souza and John Sullivan; opening Friday at University Place 8 in Carbondale. ROGER MOORE MCCLATCHY-TRIBUNE NEWS
AP | TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX FILM
Jason Clarke as Malcolm (foreground) and (background from left) Andy Serkis as Caesar, Toby Kebbell as Koba and Karin Konova as Maurice in a scene from ‘Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.’
Director Matt Reeves (“Let Me In”) gives “Dawn” a very human touch, both through the emotional complexities of the humans and the social structure of the apes. The humans are a mix of the cautiously hopeful main ape contact, Malcolm (Jason Clarke); the deeply determined caregiver, Ellie (Keri Russell); and the emotionally broken leader, Dreyfus (Gary Oldman). They represent the best and worst that mankind still has to offer. They’re counterparts are good-hearted leader
Caesar (Andy Serkis), inquisitive scholar Maurice (Karin Konoval) and ambitious adviser Koba (Toby Kebbell). They show that while the apes strive to rise above the foibles that make mankind so flawed, they are developing into a society with equally as many problems. Reeves blends these well-developed characters with some extremely impressive battle sequences, especially the showdown for control of the city. The computergenerated apes are nearly
flawless, especially in how much emotion they show. It’s a light year beyond the groundbreaking makeup used in the original “Planet of the Apes” film series. The only technical blemish in “Dawn” is a lackluster 3-D element that looks flat. Bad 3-D has become a recurring theme in movies. When Reeves cranks up the action, “Dawn” packs a pretty powerful punch. But it’s all of the attention to character that elevates “Dawn” above the typical summer fodder.
It takes 90 minutes for Dinesh D’Souza’s rambling, mistitled “America: Imagine the World Without Her” to get to its real point. There’s D’Souza, arch-conservative Ivy League immigrant, creator of the popular anti-Obama screed “2016: Obama’s America,” in handcuffs. “I made a mistake,” he says to the conservative choir he’s preaching to. We’re supposed to know he pleaded guilty to felony federal campaign finance law violations back in May, and that he faces prison time when he’s sentenced later this year. Snippets of assorted Fox TV commentators link that conviction to his earlier film criticizing Barack
Obama. The implication is that he’s a martyr to the cause. And for those in his choir a little slower to catch on, he cuts to an actor playing Abe Lincoln, giving his “farewell address,” a speech freighted with symbolism. “I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may return.” Cut to John Wilkes Booth, an assassination, and a great Republican lost to history. What doesn’t matter is that Lincoln actually gave that address as he left Illinois for Washington in 1861, four years before his assassination. What does is D’Souza’s almost comical gall at daring to make the comparison. “America” sets itself up as a piece of documentary counter-history, opening with George Washington not surviving the 1777 defeat at the Battle of Brandywine, which causes Mount Rushmore and the Statue of Liberty to dissolve. Where would the world be if America wasn’t here? But D’Souza abandons that as he posits his main thesis — that a conspiracy
by academics and activists has created a culture of “shame” about American history. He lists five “indictments” that Native American activists, Mexican-American academics, African-American leaders, leftist historians and the Occupy Movement have sold the American public — that we stole Indian land, Mexican land, African slaves, global colonies (and oil) and that capitalists are stealing from each and every one of us, even today. Then he sets out to dismiss each of those indictments. He’s on his safest ground going after historian Howard Zinn, whose “People’s History of the United States” is a de-mythologized look at assorted American wrongs, dating from European settlement of the New World, to slavery, Indian “genocide” and through Vietnam and today’s “Oil Wars.” Zinn is darling of the left — Hollywood liberals embraced him — which makes him a good conservative whipping boy. Yes, his book is taught in a lot SEE ‘AMERICA’ / PAGE 12
ARound You are hereby invited to attend
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4th Annual SIC Student Showcase Cosmetology
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Friday July 11, 2014 at 7 p.m.
Flipside Thursday, July 10, 2014 Page 11