Military Movies - Military Times

‘Man of the Year’: The accidental president

These days, the dysfunctional American political scene would seem to be beyond the reach of satire. But in “Man of the Year,” writer-director Barry Levinson takes his best shots — and scores more than a few hits.

Say this for the film: It’s nothing if not topical.

In spinning a story about a talk-show comedian (Robin Williams) who runs for president — and ends up winning — Levinson has fun toying with the popular notion that funnymen like Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert and Bill Maher have somehow become political journalism’s new avatars of truth.

Levinson, who also satirized politics in his underrated 1997 film, “Wag the Dog,” riffs on such related themes as the problem-plagued logistics of our voting process and the idea of a vast electoral “middle” sitting on the sidelines in fed-up disgust while the rabid mobs on either fringe claw at each other for self-serving purposes.

Ah, you say, but where’s the ha-ha? After all, the trailer paints “Man of the Year” as a typical Robin Williams nut-fest. And so it is, at least at the outset.

Tom Dobbs (Williams) is a talk-show host in the Leno/Letterman mold. As such, his monologues are studded with political jibes.

With his longtime manager Jack Menken (national treasure Christopher Walken) and top joke writer Eddie Langston (comedian Lewis Black), Dobbs has built a huge career on taking potshots at the high and mighty.

Then one night, an audience member poses a question: “Why don’t you run for president?”

Well … why not? Dobbs jokingly agrees, never thinking it will go further than a running gag on his show. But in a wink to the power of the Internet to instantly turn the goofiest grass-roots ideas into broad national crusades, millions of e-mails supporting “Dobbs for President” suddenly pour in.

In the blink of an eye, he’s on the ballot as an independent — and when the polls close on the big day, he is President-elect Tom Dobbs.

Up to that point, the film is a high-energy rush, as Dobbs hits the campaign trail to pound away at corrupt special interests, campaign finance and dozens of other hot-button issues in a full-throated roar that would make Howard Beale of “Network” proud.

It’s all capped by a wild debate with the two prepackaged, blow-dried establishment candidates who, compared with Dobbs, seem like robots off an assembly line.

But this sequence consumes only the first 45 minutes of screen time, after which the film takes a hard turn into something quite different: a straight drama.

This side of the story features Laura Linney as Eleanor Green, a computer expert for Delacroy, a company hawking a new touch-screen voting machine that has just seen its first widespread use in the presidential election.

Eleanor has found that a glitch in the software completely skewed the election results. Dobbs did not win; in fact, he didn’t even come close. And she’s suddenly making noise about going public with that news.

Of course, her sleazy corporate bosses (Jeff Goldblum and David Alpay) will do anything to shut her up, and the film becomes a race to see if they can silence her before she gets to Dobbs and reveals the truth.

This abrupt shift in tone makes it tough to avoid feeling like the victim of a bait-and-switch, and it doesn’t help that Williams, despite fine work in other dramatic roles in recent years, is consistently upstaged by the wonderfully weird Walken, the irresistibly cute Linney and the perpetually acerbic Black.

That said, the last hour is hardly unwatchable or unworthy. Anything that might serve to stir the masses from their apathy, even a little bit, can’t hurt. And truth be told, the film does tuck a steady stream of choice lines into its odd corners.

In the end, it’s hard not to like a movie that has lines like: “I love a man who’s not afraid to go into the wetlands and drill.”

What’s so funny about that? Think double entendre, friends … think double entendre.

3 stars. Rated PG-13 for language and adult themes. Got a rant or rave about the movies? E-mail cvinch@atpco.com.