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2014 American film
| America: Imagine the World Without Her | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by |
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| Written by |
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| Produced by |
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| Starring | Dinesh D'Souza |
| Cinematography | Benjamin Huddleston |
| Edited by |
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| Music by |
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| Distributed by | Lionsgate |
| Release dates |
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| Running time | 103 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $14,444,502 |
America: Imagine the World Without Her is a 2014 American political documentary film by Dinesh D'Souza. It is based on D'Souza's book of the same name, in which he examines various accusations against the United States. D'Souza was executive producer of the film and co-directed it with John Sullivan. Gerald R. Molen also produced. He had served as producer of D'Souza's previous film, 2016: Obama's America.
Synopsis
Setting the stage for a presentation of their views, D'Souza and Sullivan provide counterfactual histories in which George Washington is killed during the Revolutionary War, or the country is divided following civil war, creating a world without America that would be vastly worse off. He claims modern leftists are “telling a new story”, however, contradicting traditional veneration for America in order to “convince a nation to author its own destruction” and “unmake the America that is here now.” He then challenges several "indictments" made against the country and American exceptionalism, including sociology professor and activist Michael Eric Dyson's claim that “Thievery" was the “critical element” for “American empire” and historian and activist Ward Churchill's assertion that the US is the world's new evil empire, and says that 1960s Chicago radical Saul Alinski, historian Howard Zinn, and others have promoted guilt and resentment regarding wealth inequality that has helped shape the political careers of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
D'Souza argues that America's wealth has been created, not stolen. He says the $700 used to purchase colonial Manhattan from American Indians could buy many desolate parcels globally today, but that individual industry has made New York real estate worth billions. He states that in Europe, India, and elsewhere most countries have been founded on conquest, and observes that the American pattern of wealth creation hasn't been the universal norm. He cites examples like Arab historian Ibn Khaldun preferring looting to trade and says that merchants form Hinduism’s second-lowest social caste.
The film argues that American Indians exhibited this "conquest ethic" among themselves, and that most of what American Indian depopulation occurred during European colonization resulted from the accidental transmission of plagues that had earlier devastated Europe, not an intent to wipe out a people. It says modern American Indians have little interest in returning to their hunter-gatherer past. In an interview Senator Ted Cruz compares the Texas Revolution to the American Revolution. Professor and Reconquista advocate Charles Truxillo is contrasted with an interviewed American of Mexican descent who says he has no desire to return to a poverty and crime ridden Mexico and instead wants to live the "American Dream".
D'Souza says that slavery impeded American development, rather than boosting it. The film argues that slavery was an omnipresent phenomenon for most of human history, but that its abolition was "uniquely Western", noting the rarity of a "great war fought to end slavery" like the American Civil War. According to the film the Declaration of Independence essentially says “liberty is the solution to injustice,” a “promissory note” cashed throughout history by Americans such as Martin Luther King, Jr.. C.J. Walker, the black entrepreneur and daughter of slaves who is regarded as America's first self made female millionaire, is cited as an example of the type of individual success story the American system allows that is ignored by historians like Zinn because it undermines their leftist narrative. Columbia University economist Jagdish Bhagwati is shown saying that the “world is embracing the free market,” for which there is “no reason for us to be apologetic.” The film outlines how free enterprise, consumer choice rather than coercion, has raised living standards by making existing goods cheaper and creating new ones.
The film challenges the notion that America is a rapacious conqueror by arguing that Americans have sacrificed for human well being around the world, including places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Germany, and Japan, seeking in return only “enough ground to bury” their dead, as former Secretary of State Colin Powell is quoted as saying. A US veteran of Hanoi Hilton captivity is interviewed discussing his desire to liberate Vietnam. D'Souza reflects on Lincoln's assassination and the continuing cost of freedom, saying that we no longer have past heroes like Washington and Lincoln, but "we do have us” in “our struggle for the restoration of America.”
Cast
- Dinesh D'Souza – himself
- Don Taylor – President Abraham Lincoln
- Michelle Swink – Mary Todd Lincoln
- Josh Bonzie – Frederick Douglass
- Janitta Swain – Madame C. J. Walker
- Rett Terrell – Alexis de Toqueville
- Russell W. Reed – Actor at Ford's Theatre
- John Koopman – George Washington
- Tina Fortune – Hispanic worker
- Casey Allen – Crew member
- Rodney Luis Aquino – Hernan Cortes
- Joey Arguello – East Indian
- Michael D. Arite – Major Henry Rathbone
- Oscar Azul – Officer
- Andrew Baker – Lucayan Indian
- Chad Baker – Gustave de Beaumont
- Katy Baker – Audience member at Lincoln-Douglas debate
- Diana Baracaldo – Lucayan Indian
- Mateo Baracaldo – Lucayan Indian
- Chris Barber – Middle Eastern Sheik
- Crystal Barragan – East Indian Lucayan Indian
- Brian Rubright – Priest
- Rich Bentz – Saul D. Alinsky
- David C Tam - Wagon Master
Production
America: Imagine the World Without Her is directed by Dinesh D'Souza and John Sullivan. The two wrote a screenplay with Bruce Schooley based on D'Souza's book of the same title. The documentary was produced under the director's company D'Souza Entertainment.
Marketing and release
Marketing for the film included the distribution of a sample sermon and film clips to 120,000 churches in the United States. The film was given a wide release on July 2 and it finished #11 in the weekend box office for July 4 through 6 grossing $2,743,753 for a total gross of $5,352,705 after its opening weekend. The film did not perform as well as D'Souza's earlier film 2016: Obama's America, but as of August 2014 it ranks as the sixth highest grossing political documentary of all time.
The Costco chain removed the book from its shelves shortly before the film was released. On the Fox News network show, Hannity, D'Souza accused Costco of removing the books for political reasons. Costco reversed its decision and announced that the book would return to its shelves in coming weeks.
Critical response
CinemaScore reported that its sample of opening night audiences gave the film what The Wrap identified as a rare A+ grade on a scale of A+ to F.
The film review website Metacritic surveyed 11 critics and assessed 10 reviews as negative and 1 as mixed, with none being positive. It gave an aggregate score of 15 out of 100, which indicates "overwhelming dislike". The similar website Rotten Tomatoes surveyed 24 critics and, categorizing the reviews as positive or negative, assessed 22 as negative and 2 as positive. Of the 24 reviews, it determined an average rating of 2.9 out of 10. The website gave the film an overall score of 8% and said of the consensus, "Passionate but poorly constructed, America preaches to the choir."
Martin Tsai of the Los Angeles Times wrote that the film was "far more invested in elaborate historical reenactments, hypothetical dramatizations and special effects than interviews, research and data." Joe Leydon of Variety wrote that "For the most part, however, D'Souza gives the impression of someone obsessed with whitewashing any and all dark chapters in U.S. history books." David Ehrlich of The A.V. Club wrote "America is astonishingly facile, a film comprised entirely of straw man arguments." James Rocchi of The Wrap wrote "America isn't a documentary; it's more like the badly-filmed version of a badly-written, meandering op-ed piece from a paper that lacks fact-checking or proofreading."
Breitbart reviewer Christian Toto wrote that America gives "context to some of the country's sins in a fashion rarely heard in popular culture. Each rebuttal needs more time, more explanation, but for those weaned on Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States it will be eye opening."
References
- ^ America (2014) at Box Office Mojo (as of 5 September 2014)
- Bond, Paul (May 28, 2014). "Dinesh D'Souza's 'America' to Feature Megadeth Founder's Heavy Metal National Anthem (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter.
- ^ Bond, Paul (June 16, 2014). "Dinesh D'Souza's 'America' Marketing Targets Church Groups". The Hollywood Reporter.
Religious leaders will be provided video clips to show parishioners, including one of Ronald Reagan and another of George Washington fighting in the Revolutionary War.
- McKay, Hollie (July 2, 2014). "Dinesh D'Souza's 'America' imagines the world without the USA". foxnews.com. Los Angeles: Fox News Entertainment.
- D'Souza, Dinesh (2014). America.
- "America: Imagine the World Without Her". Americathemovie.com. Retrieved July 16, 2014.
- Buchanan, Jason. "Synopsis". Fandango.com. Rovi.
- Harrod, Andrew E. (July 2, 2014). "Imaging a World without America; Dinesh D'Souza's New Film Refutes Detractors Who Scorn Her History". Washington, DC: The Washington Times. Retrieved July 28, 2014.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - Harper, Jennifer (July 2, 2014). "Inside the Beltway: John Voight Steps Up to Support 'America' Movie". Washington, DC: The Washington Times. Retrieved July 28, 2014.
{{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) – via Questia (subscription required) - Weekend Box Office Results for July 4–6, 2014 – Box Office Mojo
- ^ Cunningham, Todd (July 6, 2014). "Dinesh D'Souza's Doc 'America' Can't Match Box-Office Lightning of His '2016: Obama's America'". The Wrap. Retrieved August 19, 2014.
- "Documentary – Political". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved July 15, 2014.
- Barnhart, Melissa (July 9, 2014). "Dinesh D'Souza Says Costco's Decision to Pull His Book From Stores Was Politica". Christian Post. Retrieved August 20, 2014.
- "'Clearly Political': D'Souza Reacts After Book Is Pulled Off Costco Shelves". Fox News Insider. Fox News. July 8, 2014. Retrieved August 20, 2014.
- Weekend Report: 'Transformers' Repeats On Weak Independence Day Weekend – Box Office Mojo
- "America Reviews". metacritic.com. Metacritic. Retrieved November 3, 2014.
- "America: Imagine the World Without Her". rottentomatoes.com. Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved November 3, 2014.
- Toto, Christian (July, 2, 2014). "'AMERICA' Review: Full-throated defense of U.S. in time for the fourth". Breitbart.com. Retrieved 19 August 2014.
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