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PLOT: The fates of a fame-seeking starlet, a dimbulb president, a morally bankrupt reality TV producer and a Broadway-loving Iraqi terrorist collide during the finale of an American Idol-type talent show.
From the TV spots played during virtually every commercial break on American Idol, you'd probably assume American Dreamz is a richly deserved send-up of reality TV, that George Dubya fellow and Americans' love-hate relationship with both of them.
And you'd be wrong.
Comedy is supposed to be funny, and satire is supposed to be cutting. But aside from the brief moments when American Dreamz finds its funnybone (or its testicles), this flick is neither.
Writer/director Paul Weitz, the guy behind the over-the-top goofiness of American Pie and the heartfelt humour of About A Boy, seems to be aiming for a mix of the two, and lands squarely in a comedic no-man's land between them.
It's too bad, really. Hugh Grant out-bastards even Simon Cowell himself as the shallow, manipulative creator and host of American Dreamz, an Idol-like talent show that's the top-rated program on TV.
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Mandy Moore, who can both sing and act but doesn't do either particularly well here, is the small-town girl who quickly finds out which buttons she has to push in order to get to the top -- including those of Grant's Martin Tweed, in a sex scene which mercifully happens offscreen. Ick.
Dennis Quaid is the dim and depressed president whose puppet master of a veep (Willem Dafoe) books him as a guest judge on the live finale of American Dreamz to get him back into the public eye. And that puts the prez within suicide-bombing range of a reluctant Iraqi terrorist (Sam Golzari), who has infiltrated the show's ranks as a contestant.
Given targets as juicy as reality TV, a lame-duck president and a questionable war on terrorism, it's almost criminal that American Dreamz is so toothless. There's a laugh here and there, though virtually none comes from the movie's wimpy, on-the-nose swipes at its subjects, which feel like the U.S.'s answer to a Royal Canadian Air Farce sketch.
And although Grant is great as the slimy and nearly soulless host, American Dreamz, the movie, spends very little time on the set of American Dreamz, the TV show. The handful of Simon Cowell-worthy jabs that Grant's character takes at the contestants are all in the film's trailer.
Only in the last 15 minutes or so does American Dreamz look as if it might redeem itself, skirting close to black comedy in the home stretch. (And let it be said that all movies with Chris Klein in them should be required by law to end this way.)
But even the president ends up being a great guy once all is said and done. The moral?
Smile, don't think too hard, and everything will turn out more or less OK. Sound advice if you plan to see this movie.
BOTTOM LINE: American Dreamz puts reality TV and U.S. politics in its crosshairs, then fails to pull the trigger. It's less entertaining than an average episode of American Idol. And that's saying something.
(This film is rated PG)