An interesting and downright bizarre battle is brewing in America's cineplexes this weekend as a film from the Michael Moore school of nonfiction filmmaking (celebrity host explores controversial topic with alternating humor and horror) shares screens with a film that lampoons Michael Moore. While the former is already shaping up to be a draw in home of America's media elites, one wonders just who it is that's craving a taste of the latter.
The Chicago Tribune's Michael Phillips weighed in on RELIGULOUS v. AN AMERICAN CAROL earlier this week:
"On Friday a deeply divided America will have another round of new films to choose from at the theaters. One is "Religulous," a comic documentary in which Bill Maher, America's best-known agnostic humorist—some would characterize him as the heretofore-undiscovered category beyond atheist—travels the world and leaves us with a vision of the destructive forces of organized religion, a vision no less apocalyptic than the end-times scenarios promulgated by some of his targets.
Then there's "An American Carol," which its maker, "Airplane!" and "Naked Gun" alum David Zucker, describes as "the opposite of the Bill Maher movie."
Zucker's proudly conservative comedy, which won't be screened for critics before Friday's opening, isn't primarily about religion. It reworks the Charles Dickens "A Christmas Carol" scenario so that a leftist filmmaker based on Michael Moore, painted here as an unpatriotic, America-hating boob out to banish the 4th of July, is visited, schooled and slapped around by ghosts of Americans past, George Washington (Jon Voight) and Gen. George Patton (Kelsey Grammer), plus a ghost of the future, played by country star Trace Adkins.
According to Zucker, the film is more about supporting America's war in Iraq and taking down liberal filmmakers such as Moore and George Clooney than getting people into the churches and the synagogues. Nonetheless, the two movies, one a true believer and the other a true skeptic, pose similar questions. Can a polemical comedy bring the funny? And can a fiercely partisan message connect with audiences?"
It's hard to think of another major movie taking the time to spoof a documentary filmmaker. I suppose that there are folks out there who are craving for Michael Moore to get his cinematic comeuppance. But since a number of nonfiction takes on Moore's many sins have largely fallen flat with audiences, it's hard to guess who's really waiting to see Grammer and Voight take their shots."
AMERICAN CAROL goes big and wide today, opening on more than 1,600 screens (yikes), while RELIGULOUS preaches in 500. It's almost assured that RELIGULOUS will have a higher per screen average, the real question is whether RELIGULOUS' box office take exceeds that of CAROL, despite playing on over 3x the number of screens.
A more interesting counterpoint to RELIGULOUS actually comes next weekend, when Rocky Mountain Pictures, the folks who successfully marketed EXPELLED to the faithful, releases the narrative biopic BILLY: THE EARLY YEARS OF BILLY GRAHAM. The film is directed by Ice Castles heartthrob Robby Benson (oh, where have you gone, Lynn-Holly Johnson?) and if that's not enough late 1970s nostalgia to get you to the theater, it also features, in the role of Graham's mother, Morrow, the Bionic Woman herself, Lindsey Wagner.
UPDATE Sunday 5 October: RELIGULOUS scores the top doc opening of 2008.
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