OUR BRAND IS CRISIS B
USA (107 mi) 2015 d: David Gordon Green Official
Movie Site
David Gordon Green uses Sandra Bullock in the social
activist, Julia Roberts Best Actress role from ERIN BROCKOVICH (2000),
transported to the mean streets of La Paz, Bolivia in this clever fictionalized
remake of Rachel Boynton’s 2005 documentary film by the same name, where
Bullock actually assumes the role of real-life Clinton political strategist
James Carville who was improbably hired to resuscitate the flailing campaign of
one of the political candidates in the 2002 Bolivian presidential
election. Brought out of retirement
by an old friend Nell (Ann Dowd), who’s certain she’s the right person for the
job, though she’s been living in near seclusion, “Calamity” Jane Bodine (Sandra
Bullock) seems to have lost touch with the human race, initially showing no
interest whatsoever in getting her feet back into the fire of another political
campaign, then doing a complete reversal after discovering the opposition
candidate, currently running away in the polls, is being managed by her
professional nemesis Pat Candy (Billy Bob Thornton), a master of the dirty
tricks campaign. With that she tosses
her hat into the ring, making a dubious arrival on her lengthy flight into the
mountainous region of La Paz, stumbling down the stairs off the plane,
immediately suffering from altitude sickness, surrounded on all sides by
mountains, where the city elevation varies from 10,500 to
13,500 feet. Something of a medical
wreck for the first couple of days, she belongs in the infirmary, barely able
to stand, much less run a campaign, keeping a low profile in order to observe
just how objectionable and dysfunctional her candidate really is. A former President, Pedro Castillo (Joaquim
de Almeida) is behind in all the polls as he was literally loathed and despised
when he “served” in office earlier, viewed as aloof and uncharismatic, developing
a tin ear when it comes to listening or responding to the needs of others, but
is known for being his own man, stubbornly set in his ways, wealthy and aristocratic,
where money appears to be no object, which explains how Jane was literally
plucked out of obscurity.
Just when you think this film is going nowhere, as you
quickly tire of Bullock’s continual sick gags, a return to the physical comedy
of the silent era where she barely utters a word, all it takes is the slimy
appearance of a snake-like Candy himself to get everyone’s blood boiling, as
he’s a slick marketeer, where his lovable ads cover up the fact that he’s a
completely unscrupulous human being that may as well be the devil incarnate, as
the guy loves political trash talking, getting in your face and personal, all
done with the arrogance and southern charm of moral duplicity, where he’d sell
out his own mother in a nanosecond.
What’s perhaps most astonishing is that Jane has little regard for
actual Bolivian politics herself and makes no attempt whatsoever to learn,
running a campaign where it’s never about “issues,” but instead resorts to an
all-out frontal assault, waging a war generating tabloid-style headlines, where
winning is the only object. When it becomes clear her candidate simply
doesn’t have the charisma needed to win, she resorts to denigrating the other
guys in the race, starting salacious rumors, planting false stories on TV and in
the newspapers, effectively placing the other candidates on the defensive. While much of this is played for laughs, as
the degree of comic absurdity is remarkably clever, even for the lowest of gutter
politics, but there’s also an underlying level of decency playing out throughout
as well, as represented by Anthonie Mackie as Ben, one of the American
consultants who is something of a straight shooter, providing an unshakable
moral center throughout, but most significantly personified by a local kid named
Eduardo (Reynaldo Pacheco), a decent guy and a true believer, even if he comes across
with the innocence and naïveté of Daily
Planet photographer and would-be cub reporter Jimmy Olsen. Eduardo’s claim to fame is a photograph taken
when he was a baby being held in the arms of President Castillo, symbolic for
depicting Castillo as the father of the nation, making Eddie a steadfast
supporter for life, though his views sadly change on Castillo’s first day in
office. While the film attempts to show
democracy in action, with behind-the-scenes meetings, making use of polls and
support groups, developing a candidate’s image in one breath while tarnishing
the opposition in the next, going on the road for multiple campaign stops where
literally anything can happen, the film is more obsessed by the cynical shenanigans
of professional smear artists, the ones who willingly start false rumors or
make outrageous accusations, at least planting the seed of doubt in the minds
of the voters.
Of particular interest, there are repeated images of
seemingly spontaneous grass roots demonstrations on the street drawing swelling
crowds, beautifully captured by Green’s longtime cinematographer Tim Orr, as
well as campaign visits to the more remote hinterlands, where Green’s eye for
detail is remarkable. The insight into the
cultural diversity of this tiny nation is utterly captivating, though the film
is mostly a comic portrayal of imported arrogance and betrayal, leaving behind
a real-life horror show, where Castillo is based upon the exploits of Sánchez
de Lozada who was twice elected President of Bolivia, spending his childhood
years receiving an education in the United States, studying literature and
philosophy at the University of Chicago, resulting in the fact he never
developed a natural Spanish accent, leading many Bolivians to refer to him as El Gringo. While the back and forth chemistry between Billy
Bob Thornton and Sandra Bullock leads to hilarious overkill, amusingly rising
to the level of contemptuous and personally hateful, the poison interjected
into Bolivian politics is no joke considering the backwardness and poverty
levels in Bolivia, which was the second poorest nation in the hemisphere after
Haiti prior to World War II, though there is enormous mineral wealth almost
exclusively mined by outside colonial interests prior to the nationalization of
the industry following the 1952 revolution, where there were 14 coups d’états
in the 20th century alone, with only China, Greece, Haiti, and Thailand with
more throughout their entire histories. Still
to this day, 8% of landowners own more than 95% of the farmable land, or put in
another way, 615 landowners own more than half the farmable land in the
country, while hundreds and thousands of peasants are forced to serve them for
little or no pay. Nearly two-thirds of
the population are indigenous people, the largest of any Latin American nation,
where more than 90% of them are illiterate, while 80% speak no language other
than their own, which means they can’t understand the official governmental
language of Spanish. While this is a
unique demographic, to say the least, especially the incomprehensible and
mostly illiterate rural vote (described at one point where winning them over
would be like an American candidate having to sway 200 million Apaches), the
cynicism asserted by the American politicos reduces legitimate social concerns
to a Wild West shootout, winner take all, where the sad fact of the matter is
the winner is no more experienced, trustworthy, or driven to promote healthy social
changes than the guy they’re kicking out, as the election campaign doesn’t
produce political messages or ideas but is all about mudslinging and
annihilating the opposition’s credibility.
Ironically, the “loser” of this election, populist candidate Evo
Morales, is currently the sitting President of the nation elected four years
later in 2006. Talk about long term
consequences — a year after winning the 2002 election de Lozada resigned and fled
back to America after being chased from office after a reported massacre by
armed Bolivian troops at a public demonstration over the Bolivian gas conflict, where strikes and
roadblocks brought the nation to a standstill, resulting in 67 deaths, largely
protesters and bystanders, but also some soldiers and policemen, where de
Lozada’s extradition request to stand trial in Bolivia is still under appeal
more than a decade later.
