With the election season on the verge of swinging into full gear I’m compiling a list of the greatest moments in movie political comedy and satire. I’m not looking for political films per se — it could be something as simple as an expertly tossed wisecrack.
My own favorite is a moment in Alfred Hitchcok’s “The 39 Steps.” And I say that even though it’s British and I generally prefer American humor. In it, Robert Donat is running from the police (I believe this is the first instance where Hitch uses the, now perhaps too familiar, innocent-man-accused-of-crime gambit) and inadvertently winds up on a stage where he has to address a political meeting. He has no idea which party or what issue he’s supposed to address. So he gives them generalized ,uplifting blather while trying to hide the fact that he’s got a pair of handcuffs dangling off one of his wrists. He eventually gets arrested and is taken off stage by the police to rousing applause. Marvelous.
My list so far:
The 39 Steps
Front Page — Mayor dishing out blather to cynical reporters that everyone knows is s*** but will play well in the morning papers.
Great McGinty — McGinty apparently sets record for number of times having voted in one election
Bullworth — the whole damn movie
State of the Union — Actually this is a bad movie, but you do get to see Carl “Alfalfa” Switzer after he is no longer a child but well before he gets shot
Tanner — never saw it, but there must be something there
Pat Paulson — great sequence in which they show him praising every state he visits as the best and talking about how much he hates all the other states
The Candidate — “What do we do now?”
The Great Dictator — Chaplin, playing Adenoid Hynkle, a Hitler-like knock-off (how’s that for subtlety?), holds and kisses a baby and then has to wipe his hands (for even more subtlety).
Duck Soup — numerous including (sung) “The country’s taxes must be fixed and I know what to do with it. If you think you’re paying too much now just wait’ll I get through with it.”
Little Abner — song “The Country’s in the Very Best of Hands”
Hail the Conquering Hero — satire about a phoney war hero running for office (if you think this sounds strangely familiar, I should mention that the main character does so unwillingly and that at no point does he wear a flight suit).
I got one for you. James Gregory played a moronic, McCarthyesque Senator in The Manchurian Candidate. While talking with his wife, Angela Lansbury, over dinner, he’s whining that he’d like for them to settle on an exact number of Communists that he’s accusing of being in the U.S. government. (Every time the papers want to quote him, he’s been blurting out a different number.) Lansbury acquiesces, and as she’s mulling over what number will be easy for this dolt to remember, she watches him smacking ketchup onto his filet mignon. Cut to Gregory standing on the Senate floor, grandly declaring that he has indisputable proof of 57 card-carrying Communists in the United States government.
Esposito’s speech after the revolution succeeds in Bananas:
“From this day on, the official language of San Marcos will be Swedish. In addition to that, all citizens will be required to change their underwear every half-hour. Underwear will be worn on the outside so we can check. Furthermore, all children under 16 years old are now… 16 years old!”
I’m particularly fond of the “football game” scene from The Mouse That Roared, but for all-time political humor, I tip my hat to Dr. Strangelove.
In fact, one of my father’s single favorite movie lines of all time was Col. “Bat” Guano allowing Group Captain Mandrake to break open the soft drink machine for change to call the White House. “If this doesn’t work. . . you’re going to have to answer to the Coca Cola company!”
Maybe a stretch, and certainly among the lowest of common denominators, but all the same:
How about the scene in Blazing Saddles where Mel Brooks’ character conducts the meeting in which he (almost) has his cabinet trained to deliver harrumphs of supportive indignation at the appropriate times (“I didn’t get a harrumph out of that guy”), and despairs that they must do something to save their “phony-baloney jobs”?
This falls under the category of “unintentionally hilarious.”
A couple years ago I was watching The Apartment (1960) at the Stanford Theater in Palo Alto. During one scene Jack Lemmon is in a bar and some drunk lady begins to chat him up and then complains “say, I sure am sick of that Fidel Castro!” I wished I could’ve sidled up to her just then and said “Wait’ll you see how sick of him you are in about 40+ years!”
Actually, he used it in The Lodger, a silent movie before the 39 Steps. The Lodger has been dubbed “The first true Hitchcock film”. Don’t know if it was used in between these two movies.
As for the OP, I just saw Dave and there a few good moments in that.
I like the part where Oliver Stone is on Larry King talking about how pictures of the President before and after the stroke looked different.
It’s unsubtle and somewhat dated but the film Wild in the Streets has lots of great political humor based around the generation gap with the Baby Boomers and the whole “Don’t trust anyone over 30” mindset. I love how the revenge on Hawaii for its failure to support Max Frost is to vegetize the population by loading the water supply with LSD. The adults herded into the concentration camps (“I’m young! I’m young!”) and kept docile with LSD as well is funny and odd. But I love the “youth consuming itself” ending too.
I may have the exacy words wrong, but anyway: The line in Sneakers when a homeless guy, sitting on the ground in front of a wall covered in Goorge H. W. Bush posters, asks Robert Redford for a handout. Redford points to the posters and says, “Talk to him.”
The whole 2001 film No Man’s Land has political and diplomatic themes focused on the Serbo-Croatian conflict in minature, but there are some very funny dark comedy moments.
“It’s the Smurfs!” - the main characters referring the arrival of UN peacekepers, with their white vehicles and blue helmets.
“Who started the war?”
“You did!” Points a gun at the other man."Now…tell me. Who started the war?
“We did.”
A wounded and boobytrapped man being left for dead because of the bad PR if the media were to film his death during the inevitable failed rescue attempt.
Actually, this techinicall isn’t from a movie but it’s still a great moment. It’s in the Simpsons’ “Treehouse of Horrors” episode where evil space aliens Kang and Kudos first kidnap and then disguise themselves as Bill Clinton and Bob “Third Person” Dole so that they can run against each other for president. Kang goes on to win even after they have both been exposed by Homer because, as Kang so cannilly points out, third-party candidates never win so why waste your vote? In the last seen Marge and Homer are working together as slave laborers and Marge mentions that she really doesn’t like the looks of that huge ray gun pointing straight up into the sky. “Don’t blame me,” says Homer, “I voted for Kudos.”
My favorite part is where Chaplin plays with the Globe.
My other favorite part is imagining the screening of the film for Hitler. Adoph was a fan of Chaplin. Well, not after this movie came out but I like trying to imagin Hitler watching this film parody of himself by one of the greatest comedians of his age.
Another great one is Wag the Dog. Deeply disturbing.
Actually, if the Internet Movie Data Base (www.imdb.com) is to be believed, Hitler watch the film. Twice. Unfortunately, there is no record of his reacation. It was, as you might imagine, verbotten for other Germans to see it.
Also, it is said that some resistance fighters snuck it into the projection booth at a Polish theater so an audience of German soldiers could watch it.
I just remembered this little gem from “Back to the Future.”
Dr. Emmett Brown: Then tell me, “future boy”, who is president in the United States in 1985?
Marty McFly: Ronald Reagan.
Dr. Emmett Brown: Ronald Reagan? The actor?
[chuckles in disbelief]
Dr. Emmett Brown: Who’s Vice President? Jerry Lewis?
Marty McFly: What?
Dr. Emmett Brown: I suppose Jane Wyman is the first lady. And Jack Benny is secretary of the treasury. I’ve had enough practical jokes for one evening. Good day, future boy.
