The front-runner, Victor Rivera, is a populist who is appealing to the basest emotions of that poor electorate. Castillo promises the people that will happen if hes elected. Somebody on the Castillo bus says Jane has a great ass! (And she does. Bodines character loosely channels celebrity political consultant James Carville, one of the Americans who worked on the 2002 Bolivian campaign and a consistent fascination of Hollywood. In a Netflix comedy by Katharine McPhees stepdaughter. Things you buy through our links may earnNew Yorka commission. The American consultants, not knowing the language or the culture of Bolivia, are persuaded by Bodine, a burned out veteran of American politics, to follow a strategy of smear campaigning to make up for their candidate's shortcomings. When they get home, his brothers ridicule Eddie for bringing Yankees and trusting them, and for that matter, trusting Castillo. That remains a question shrouded in mystery, but we could probably come up with some decent guesses. You\'ll receive the next newsletter in your inbox. To handle this scandal, Castillo is interviewed on TV and explains it was a visit to his son, who IS a member of the cult, and he had to wear the robe. This film isnt as dark as Burnt, and has more amusing moments, including some comic relief, but still shouldnt be classified as a comedy. They plan to frighten the people, with the aim of persuading them to vote for the unsympathetic but known Castillo rather than the younger opposition candidates. In my review of the documentary, I wrote: The process of framing Goni to look like something he isnt could be the stuff of a rambunctious campaign comedy like Primary Colors or, for that matter, the documentary The War Room And parts of Our Brand Is Crisis are darkly amusing. A timeline of the (alleged) drama involving Olivia Wilde, Harry Styles, and Florence Pugh. Though not without its entertaining momentsthe cast, led by Sandra Bullock, is energetic, sharp and gets a fair number of juicy bits to rock out with. Karen Kunawicz. And in the real Bolivian election of 02, there was no rivalry between warring American spin doctors working for different candidates, because Goni was the only candidate who got that kind of help, in clear preference to his populist opponents on both the right and left. 17-Down, Three Letters: Party for One artist Carly ___ Jepsen. The train begins to leave and Candy is furious. They are then in a restaurant, the entire campaign team drinking heavily. Jane also has to get Castillo to be totally transparent to her to uncover those skeletons that she might need to deal with, being transparent which he may not be willing to be, not realizing that her own skeletons might pop out to play. The campaign advisors are telling Castillo he needs to meet with the people and be seen as one of the people. Our Brand Is Crisis also has deeper themes that punctuate the human cost of winning and what it takes to do just that. Bush strategist Lee Atwater, who by his own reported deathbed admission was an unholy monster, and to this day keeps afloat the brand of George W. Bush strategist Karl Rove. Sandra Bullock (who shares producer credits with, among others, George Clooney and Grant Heslov) is the reclusive political strategist Calamity Jane Bodine, who turned her back on her profession after one dirty trick too many. Have they learned nothing? She is approached by Candy, who tells her hes surprised shes working on an unwinnable campaign. Not all movies preach, for example, action movies are usually more about the entertainment of watching good triumph over evil. More fliers are discovered that claim (with pictures) Castillo is a member of a crazy white-robe wearing cult. She tells Castillo and the campaign that this is no longer an election, it is a crisis. It already has. Plot out uproarious long-shot tricks against his opponents that always seem to work out even better than hoped? Our Brand Is Crisis (2015) Plot Showing all 5 items Jump to: Summaries (4) Synopsis (1) Summaries A battle-hardened American political consultant is sent to help re-elect a controversial president in Bolivia, where she must compete with a long-term rival working for another candidate. Well, this is the rambunctious comedy version of Our Brand Is Crisis, framed by director David Gordon Green and the British writer Peter Straughan not with a dead boy but the personal odyssey of a fictional character. The way Jane and her team approaches politics makes them good at their job, but it also makes them cynical people, and the movie rarely questions their behavior until the very end when it does so in the most heavy-handed manner possible. Power? A bra is used as a slingshot, and two shirtless men are briefly shown. Privacy Policy and As one of his first actions, he invites the IMF into Bolivia, thereby breaking his promise. It is revealed that she retired after violating election laws. In a restaurant, Jane sits alone until Candy sits next to her. Jane gets blasted, leaks misinformation, vandalizes Candys room, and sabotages his candidates rallies the way he sabotaged her candidates. Covering Rammsteins Du Hast in Berlin. He denies being a member of the cult. Jane yells out the window to Candy that Rivera has dropped 6 points. The real meat of the comedy, and drama, comes in the ingenious dirty tricks that Candy and Bodine play on each other, which could kick off a primer on the political practice recently known as rat-f**king (although that phrase is never uttered in the film). Castillo's American consultants, knowing that they need ideas outside the box, recruit "retired" political strategist "Calamity" Jane Bodine, who has lived somewhat off the grid and has not worked on a political campaign in six years. Election day. Washed-up political strategist Jane Bodine is hired by a political consultancy to help their client, Senator Castillo, win the Bolivian general election. All this makes for mid-grade entertainment value, at best. So they cop out, closing on an unlikely, feel-good character turn for Bodine. While Rivera is still speaking aboard a train, Jane poses as a worker for the Rivera campaign and tells the conductor the speech is over. In Bolivia, the situation is tense: Bodine learns that the indigenous people, who are a majority in the country but lack any real political power, are protesting for constitutional reform to get proper representation. We root for Jane to win and feel guilty for caring more about the game than the country. Jane insist they go negative in spite of this, but Castillo says no. At a large debate with all the candidates, Jane is found behind the stage backdrop during the debate. The opposition's top political consultant is her nemesis, fellow American Pat Candy. Its great fun. But Boynton has done her own framing: This campaign is a precursor to tragedy. Underneath it all plays Ten Years Afters Id Love To Change The World, the absolute nadir of Woodstock-era protest rock; the movies sound editor deserves some kind of award for smoothly deleting the songs opening volley against dykes and fairies.. However it is better and more gratifying to win the heart of a nation and keep it. Candy gives her a condescending compliment and tells her he plans to pleasure himself thinking about her when he returns home. Even worse, it turns out to be a humanist, socialist, anti-capitalist message about "the people" rising up to establish some sort of vague communist brotherhood centered . "Our Brand is Crisis" was one of these pleasant surprises. . Candy says he will be going to overseas for a British campaign. [13] Peter Straughan was set to write the script, with Clooney attached as a potential director and star for the film, about the 2002 Bolivian presidential election's campaign by James Carville's Washington, D.C.-based political consulting firm Greenberg Carville Shrum,[14][15] which was hired by candidate Gonzalo Snchez de Lozada. They approach each other and she just smiles. Carville and Greenberg won that election for Goni, after shifting the entire theme of his campaign to the crisis mantra, but maybe they should have vetted their candidate a little better. When Bullocks passionately advocating goes negative, or Thorntons smirkingly plays Mephistopheles to her from across their hotel balconytheyre close enough to speak to each other directly, but insist on staying on their cell phonesthe movie builds up an infectious energy. There's only one wrong in this, only one, and that is losing!". Before long the SUV comes to a stop in the heavy traffic on the tiny streets. Played for laughs? And yet in David Gordon Greens tale of political fixers, Our Brand Is Crisis, he wants to find hope. When it does, Jane moons the Rivera bus. But as a whole, "Our Brand is Crisis" is a messy affair that sputters along when it should be humming with assured cynical momentum. Castillo wins the vote by a small margin. It begins poorly, with an odd montage intercut to stagey interview footage in which Bullocks character, Calamity Jane Bodine, formulates an apologia for we-dont-quite-know-what. At the start, Jane has been out of the consulting game for several years, following a traumatic mayoral race. (The daughter killed herself as a result.). George Clooney and Grant Heslov produced. Policy doesnt even enter into the conversation; its more about scoring points by making your opponent look like a Nazi sympathizer simply by virtue of a doctored photograph. Thornton is sleek, clammy, and leering. While Castillo is meeting with the press, Jane meets Eduardo. Our Brand is Crisis was one of these pleasant surprises. Can Hollywood find a way to take the political consultant character in a new direction? Now, the film is so heavily fictionalized that it's much more an emotive or thematic . The rest of the movie is her telling the story of what happened after her resignation. Our Brand is Crisis hits a lot of clunky notes and the end is unforgivably cornball, but its still one of the liveliest political black comedies Ive seen in a while. 2023's Most Anticipated Sequels, Prequels, and Spin-offs. All rights reserved. Loosely based on the 2005 documentary of the same name, Our Brand is Crisis offers a fictionalized take on the 2002 Bolivian Presidential election with a cast that includes Academy Award. Honestly, I didnt know what to expect, on a number of levels. Like before, it came from La Paz Grassroots, but this time it really did come from Candy. Besser. Theres no redemption to be found with the people who are ruining liveswho have no belief in politicians or voters; people who have basically given up on humanity and play with public policy like a kid with a loaded gun. There is only one wrong thing to do, she says: Losing. At another commercial set inside a warehouse, several llamas are there, and Castillo is set to compare the future of Bolivia with llamas, who work hard. In its opening weekend, it was projected to make $57 million from 2,202 theaters,[23] however only ended up grossing $3.2 million, finishing eighth at the box office. By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy and to receive email correspondence from us. Its yoked to an impoverished Bolivian teenager who believesdespite the angry effusions of his brother and friends in their hillside slumthat Castillo is sincere in trying to bring about economic equality. Montage of the press reporting throughout the day. When the gunfire stops, the camera moves in on a boy sitting on the steps of a building, his head partly covered by his coat as if hes grabbing a nap. [4] It was theatrically released by Warner Bros. on October 30, 2015. Around the edges of this story about Bullocks character, an especially ruthless consultant known as Calamity Jane, there are a few intriguing hints of other stories about the international financial system, the power of fear in politics and the American understanding of what democracy means when applied to other people in other countries. 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