AMERICA! AMERICA! AMERICA! AMERICA!
The Setup:
As many of you are aware, there are some enemies of our great and wonderful nation out there who don’t believe in a little something we like to call The First Amendment. Where we’re from, we get to say what we want to say whenever we want to say it because we’ve got a right to. If an American wants to express himself through, say, awful scriptwriting, he can do that. If an American wants to express himself through shitty acting, he can also do that. And if an American wants to express himself through distributing one of the worst movies of the year, it’s his God-given right to do that. Or rather, his constitutional right, but in our awe-inspiring country it amounts to the same thing. To celebrate this freedom, we sat down and watched The Interview, Kim Jong-Un and critics’ warnings be damned.
In the nation whose colors don’t run, we felt an obligation not to do so from this movie.
The Food:
We decided to prepare a traditional American dinner for such a special occasion: hot dogs, potato chips, and potato salad, paired with an American-brewed beer. I am sure this is quite confusing to our foreign readers. You may be asking yourself if it is normal to eat so many potatoes in one meal. Our answer to you is that as long as you cover some of your potatoes in mayonnaise and fry the rest of your potatoes before smothering them in ranch dressing, it is perfectly acceptable to eat more than one potato dish in one meal. All you really need is to change what kind of creamy dressing you want to put on an otherwise bland food. We could have added potato skins to the meal as long as we put a hearty dollop of sour cream on top.
For those unaware, chips are also a staple of the American diet. Adding a bag of chips to your lunch, along with a refreshing soda, is a great way to turn what would be just another meal into the sum total of your recommended daily caloric intake. Then, after lunch, any calories you consume are purely supplemental, which allows you to really experience American Plenty for dinner. Speaking of chips, we decided to fry our own chips for dinner, because we’re fancy like that. We aren’t ones to brag, but these chips turned out incredibly.
The hot dog was the final piece of the puzzle. Like Italy’s pizza, the American hot dog is loved nation-wide, but each region has its own take on it. We sampled flavors from Seattle, Chicago, and New York, along with the classic ketchup and hot dog combo. The Seattle dog features a layer of cream cheese to accompany the hot dog with caramelized onions filling in the cracks. For those hailing from New York, we made a simpler dog with just a slather of spicy dijon mustard and sauerkraut sprinkled on top. To finish out the nation-trotting trio, the Chicago dog had yellow mustard drizzled over it with chopped white onions, a little bit of relish, some diced tomato, a classic Vlasic pickle spear, and we topped it off with a little dill.
The potato salad was an important part of the quintessential American dinner. Going to an American potluck without bringing potato salad would be like driving your truck without attaching your gun rack: it simply shouldn’t be left behind. Due to its popularity at potlucks, it is not uncommon to see two or even three bowls of potato salad at one barbecue. Most guests will be happy to try all varieties because everyone has a different family recipe. Ours was mostly mayo, delicious nonetheless. Of course our American roots wouldn’t allow us to dislike it, even if it was bad.
To top the meal off, we fried up a couple pieces of bacon for each of us, because this is the United States, and popped opened the King of Beers.
For dessert, we had some all-American apple pie, made with just a hint of lemon topped with smooth vanilla bean ice cream. There’s nothing more American than apple pie, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. To really hit that point home, we used a recipe from America’s Test Kitchen to ensure our pie was as patriotic as possible. Consider this the boisterous, fireworks popping, God Bless America, of apple pies.
The Drinks:
We drank Budweiser because we really feel like it is, at its heart, an American beer. It paired nicely with the hot dogs, because we culturally liberated both from Germany. We were willing to look past the fact that it’s parent company may now be Belgian because they’ve done such a good job marketing it as an American beer.
The Rules:
- Drink every time you’re proud to be an American (where at least you know you’re free).
- Drink every time you see a racist Asian stereotype portrayed on screen.
- Finish your drink when Kim Jong-Un dies.
The Movie:
After a heartfelt American meal and a night of lively, hyper-nationalist debate, we were ready to sit down and enjoy The Interview. We really, really tried to. In the end, the only fun part of the movie was the feeling you got while you were watching it, knowing that someone out there has told you not to.
It is quite possible James Franco and Seth Rogan could tell that The Interview was shaping up to be an awful movie and just phoned in their performances, not expecting the movie to get any real press. They must have been shocked and frankly a little embarrassed when it got caught in the middle of the very real tension between the United States and North Korea at the end of 2014. They may even have been secretly pleased when they found out that the movie wouldn’t be aired in theaters. Our other theory was that North Korea watched the movie, saw how bad it was, and was doing the rest of the world a favor by holding it back: “No really guys, you don’t want to watch this.”
In the end, the movie was just another predictable, misogynistic, ethnocentric bromance. Save your time, don’t watch this movie. We really mean it. Don’t watch this movie.
The Ratings:
Andre: Thumbs down. I really wanted this movie to be funny, but it just wasn’t. I wanted it to make me proud to be an American, but it really just embarrassed me. If you want a piece about North Korea that makes you examine personal freedom and what it really means, you should read The Orphan Master’s Son.It’s so much more rewarding and thought-provoking.
Leanna: 1 puppy out of 10. It’s not a secret that this movie was awful, so instead of focusing on all the reasons why I want those two hours (seriously, this move is two hours long) of my life back, I’ll reminisce about this: the scene with the tiny, adorable dog.
This adorable baby dog provided a premise for the only witty dialogue that takes place in the whole damn movie. America salutes, you, you soft, innocent, squeal-inducing dog-child.
Ben: If I could do a good job of writing out the onomatopoeia of just one long drawn out exasperated sigh that continues for about the course of one hour and fifty-two minutes, I would because that would be the best way to present how I feel. In the end I have to give this movie a 5% and apologize to everyone who views the United States through the lens of this film. If there was ever a movie to completely excise any sense of national pride. this was it, and it did so through its extremely poor and offensive jokes and willingness to pay the people who worked on this film what was most likely a fair sum of money.
