Die Kriegsmacher

Phil Hartman is hilarious as the inept and waffling President, and Beau Bridges convincing as the Governor of Idaho, in this movie where mistakes and misread news pile up until a seemingly innocuous situation becomes a second civil war.

Phil Hartman brings some of the sarcastic wit from Newsradio into this telemovie. Some of the funniest moments are when he is actually debating with himself or others over what actions to take. Meanwhile the movie slowly progresses along the lines where not only is war imminent in the country, but war seems to be erupting everywhere between people - Congressmen, newsmen, et al...

Quite an engaging movie and the ending is one you would not want to miss as well, if just for that few seconds of riotous and comical misunderstanding.

"The Second American Civil War" appeared in the cinemas in Italy and caused many discussions probably because of the correspondences between its plot and the matter of secession in Northern Italy promoted by the Lega Nord party. Anyway, this movie is great for other reasons and deserved to be seen in the cinemas of any country. The only lack of the movie is the weakness of the characters such as the pathetic figure of the old wise journalist (James Earl Jones). However the real main character is the background, that is the society, the medias and the political class. Dante strikes all these categories with a brilliant and grotesque satire and represent all their contradictions.

The influential News Net spread idiotic and mediocre message. The politicians only care about keeping their careers with the political tricks (the ultimatum mustn't interfere with the popular soap-opera). Finally Dante paints a society that can't find an alternative between "We are all brothers" and "This is my land and here I command".

You MUST SEE it, if you have the chance because it is far the best movies of is genre (much better than "Wag the Dog")

Joe Dante's brilliant, stinging political satire The Second Civil War was awarded a pitifully limited cable release on HBO instead of the wide distribution it deserves, and I think that may have something to do with the fact that it hit a bit too close to home for some people with scarily accurate portrayal of the thoroughly idiotic state of mind that is present in every aspect of American politics. Come to think of it, the film was really prophetic when I think of how mangled things are in our neighbours disillusioned abode. Dante is a director who usually sticks to gooey fantasy/horror/comedy such as Gremlins or The Burbs, but here he ventures into the real world, without losing an ounce of his comic streak. There's trouble brewing stateside when renegade Idaho Governor Jim Farley (daft Beau Bridges) announces that he's closing his state's borders to immigrants, conveniently right at the time when Mexican refugees are scheduled to be brought in. This causes an uproar across the land as his immature antic catch the attention many different key players across the board. Ironically, he's shagging a sexy Mexican publicist (Elizabeth Pena, RIP) who is appalled with his behaviour. The frustrated US President (Phil Hartman) sends dapper 'fixer' Jack Buchan (James Coburn nails the darkly odd tone) who finds himself in over his head. Suddenly the Governor mobilizes troops to secure the state border, and schit gets real when the President retaliates by stationing forces of his own surrounding Idaho. The country seems to be on the brink of a ridiculous yet very plausible conflict of 'civil' proportions. Tension gets widespread when a hotshot New Network CEO (Dan Hedaya) and his drastic right hand man (Ron Perlman) send rogue report Denis Leary to cover the story. There's also additions to the unbelievably good cast from James Earl Jones, Roger Corman, Brian Keith, Johanna Cassidy, Dick Miller and more. The comedic tone abruptly shifts to deadly serious as actual violence erupts and we know that the film means business as our laughs go up in tank smoke as we get uncomfortable at the mirror being held. It's satire, it's fun but it's also a warning at the dangers of impulsive decision making and uneducated lunacy. At heart it's a comedy though, and a criminally overlooked one at that.

Calling it the near future in the beginning without specifying the year worked great since this could've been the actual state of the USA a couple of years ago, being absolutely the black comedy in real life. The beginning of India nuking Pakistan was not something I expected from this movie. But then that leading to internal conflict in the US, then personal situations of politicians and the prejudices of people working together to make everything worse and worse as it went on all were really great ideas. Choosing to centre the movie in a newsroom so they can cover everywhere was also a great choice. There are just so many great ideas in this film and so many commentaries made. A lot of them worked and a lot of them didn't. It was a bit overcrowded. I feel like this would've worked better if it was much longer with more things grounding it to the narrative to let the messages speak for themselves. The whole wasn't really as great as the sum of the parts. There are many things in it that are shown like they are exposing stuff, while the direction makes it feel like even while showing such things, they are not understanding the actual complexities and believe in a more idealistic world without considering what should actually be done. It could also be attributed that a lot of these might be considered hyperbolic in the 90s while it feels much closer to reality now, so that may be why the very Americanised idealistic view the makers had that they were afraid to be broken. There are also many aspects of it that clearly show this is a pre-9/11 American movie, which couldn't have been part of such a movie afterwards.

Overall, I loved a lot of it but thought some of it was pretty stupid. However, as a movie, it did work to get its point across, and being almost prophetic of how The US has become recently, it deserves appreciation, even though it has its fair share of flaws.

In a near future, after the nuclear explosion of a bomb dropped by India in Pakistan, an American non-governmental group decides to bring the Iranians orphans to Idaho. The silly governor of Idaho (Beau Bridges) is the political opponent of the American president (Phil Hartman) and decides to not permit the immigration of the children to his state. Indeed his greatest concern is relative to his sexual and affective life with the American-Mexican journalist Christina (Elizabeth Peña) and he does not give much importance to his statement. The stupid president decides to follow the advice of Jack Buchan (James Coburn) and his advisors, and sends the U. S. Army to the border of Idaho, which is protected by the National Guard troops. Due to the last chapter of a famous soap opera, the president gives sixty-seven and half hours to Idaho permit the ingress of the children. The greatest American network covers all of this confusion in a sensationalist way. All of these absurd misunderstandings together culminate in the American Second Civil War. This movie is a great dark and dramatic comedy, made before the tragedy of September 11th. In Brazil, it was not promoted and I found the VHS by chance on sale. When I saw the name of Joe Dante and the cast, I decided to buy and watch it. It was a worthwhile entertainment. It is a sort of `tribute' to the politicians, lobbyists and press in USA, and without the participation of Michael Moore. Martyn Burke and Joe Dante explore the warrior spirit and the racial segregation of the American people, the immigration problem, the lack of common sense and the search for votes of the politicians, the unreasonable advices of lobbyists and civilians and military advisors and the performance of the manipulative press in a funny (and even sad) story. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): `A Segunda Guerra Civil' (`The Second Civil War')