Americathon

1979
PG
1h 26m

IMDb RATING

4.5/10

992

YOUR RATING

In a story told in narrative flashbacks, a young TV consultant is hired by the President of a bankrupt USA to organize a telethon in order to prevent the country from being repossessed by wealthy Native Americans.

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Satire Slapstick Comedy Musical

In a story told in narrative flashbacks, young TV consultant Eric McMerkin is hired by President Chet Roosevelt of a bankrupt USA to organize a telethon in order to prevent the country from ... Read allIn a story told in narrative flashbacks, young TV consultant Eric McMerkin is hired by President Chet Roosevelt of a bankrupt USA to organize a telethon in order to prevent the country from being repossessed by wealthy Native Americans.In a story told in narrative flashbacks, young TV consultant Eric McMerkin is hired by President Chet Roosevelt of a bankrupt USA to organize a telethon in order to prevent the country from being repossessed by wealthy Native Americans.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

4.5/10

992

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 1 win & 1 nomination total

Videos2

Photos40

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
As part of the promotion for this movie's release in 1979, Ted Coombs traveled on roller-skates across the United States for a total of 5,193 miles, setting a world record. He is currently a technology author, futurist, portrait artist and forensic scientist.

Goofs
The movie mentions that people all over the country were watching the telethon, including people from the first gay state, North Dakota. We then see a picture of Mount Rushmore which is in South Dakota

Quotes
[opening sequence; two dinosaurs fighting]
Jimmy Carter: What you're looking at is downtown Pittsburgh, one million B.C. Those two big guys are fighting for a parking space. This is where our story begins. If they could have just learned to live together like decent human beings, they'd still be around and there never would have been an energy crisis. But they died out, and what was left of them turned into fossil fuel... Oil. See, it's not cute when eleven tons gets cranky. Their problem was they were all teeth and no brain...
[Shot of President Jimmy Carter]
Narrator: ...which brings us to this guy. Jimmy Carter was President of the United States when everybody started to notice we were running out of dead dinosaurs. No more gas to run our cars. Fights at the pump. People getting nozzle-whipped. So what was his solution? He made a speech.
Jimmy Carter: The energy crisis has not yet overwhelmed us. But it will, if we do not act quickly.
Narrator: We didn't. When America finally ran out of gas, an angry mob broke into the White House and lynched him. Along with three or four of his snottier cabinet members.

Connections
Featured in Sneak Previews: Sunburn, Americathon, Hot Stuff, Meatballs, The Concorde: Airport '79 (1979)

Soundtracks
It's A Beautiful Day
Written by Mike Love and Al Jardine
Performed by The Beach Boys
Produced by Bruce Johnston

User reviews19

Featured review

4/10

Good idea, not that good of an execution.

"Americathon" is about the future (1998) where the state of the USA is so bad that it's incompetent president holds a telethon to raise 400 billion dollars. The movie has surprisingly high production values, and the idea sounds good on paper. It's the script and acting that mess things up a bit.

The movie takes a while to start, mostly to squeeze in some future predictions and hit or miss jokes, but once the telethon does start, it is, yet again, mainly hit or miss jokes (mostly miss, but it did get some laughter out of me). The soundtrack was pretty good though.

Now for the acting: In my opinion, it was one of Harvey Norman's weaker performances, and Zane buzby had a really annoying fake accent (that won her "worst fake female accent" in the Stinkers Awards), but other than those and a few other smaller parts, the acting was pretty average.

Overall, it had average to weak acting, and not that good of a script. Although a neat thing about it is that some of the movie's predictions did come true later on (the collapse of the USSR and cellphones for example). 4/10.