Big-Time Dreamerz

Here's my review of "American Dreamz," which was unexpectedly left out of today's Get Out!

The judges on “American Idol” have a standard phrase when a contestant takes on a too-ambitious song: “That song was too big for you.”

That’s almost what happens to Paul Weitz, who wrote and directed the satire “American Dreamz.”

Weitz, who has moved from the “American Pie” movies to the highly regarded “About a Boy” and “In Good Company,” has huge ambitions for “Dreamz”: Not only does he want to satirize America’s fascination with reality TV contests, such as “Idol,” but he also tries to connect that willful disconnect from reality with a takedown of the Good Ol’ Boy presidency of George W. Bush.

To Weitz, the two situations are inescapably connected: The film argues that a society that’s willing to surrender so completely to manufactured reality on a TV show will also surrender completely to a manufactured reality from the White House.

The result is a frequently hilarious, but not totally successful, film.

Hugh Grant stars as Martin Tweed, the obnoxious British host of “Dreamz.” He’s a misanthrope who’s getting bored with the show and all of its attendant celebrity hoo-hah, so to make the show interesting for himself, he rigs it so that the finale comes down to an ambitious (and slightly trashy) blonde girl (Mandy Moore as Sally Kendoo) and a show tune-loving Iraqi (Sam Golzari as Omer).

Meanwhile, Dennis Quaid’s President Staton has woken up after a successful re-election and decides to start reading newspapers, any that he can get his hands on — so many that he locks himself out of sight from the country.

That causes some concern from his wife (Marcia Gay Harden) and lots of concern from his chief of staff (Willem Dafoe), who’s bald like Dick Cheney and Machiavellian like Karl Rove.

The worlds collide when the chief gets Staton booked as a guest judge on the “Dreamz” finale, where he becomes a target of the reluctant suicide bomber Omer.

Grant, as always, is slickly perfect in the role, showing us how, to paraphrase a memorable exchange, Tweed knows he needs to be a better person but that he has no real desire to become one. Moore also scores as the ruthless Sally, who’s willing to get back together with her ex when he’s nicked with a bullet in Iraq because she knows that story will help her win.

Golzari, Quaid, Harden and Dafoe also are solid, as are supporting players Jennifer Coolidge (Sally’s mother, an underwritten role) and Seth Meyers (Sally’s agent, also a little undercooked).

If anything, Weitz should have been more ruthless, but at its best, “Dreamz” is the finest bit of cinematic satire since “Wag the Dog.”