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THE
CINEMATIC HEAD OF STATE IS AN UNDISTINGUISHED GENTLEMAN
 Colin
Powell is undoubtedly the only African American today who can
gain his party's nomination for president; he can credibly
run a campaign about real problems with commonsense solutions,
and he may have an excellent chance of winning. A Hollywood
screenplay in which a Black might be elected president would
be a welcome sequel to Jonathan Lynn's The Distinguished
Gentleman (1992) in which Congressman Johnson
(played by Eddie Murphy) might parlay his exposure of how Washington
works into an effective campaign for President. Insofar as
the recent film Head of State may
be seen as that sequel, the result is extremely disappointing,
carried to a level of vulgarity that defeats the possibility
that the public will realize that there is an alternative to
politics as usual. The plot hangs on a silly premise, namely,
that one party's candidates for president and vice president
die in separate airplanes that crash into each other only weeks
before the 2004 presidential election. Senator Bill Arnot (played
by James Rebhorn), who wants to run for president in 2008,
persuades the leaders of the party to replace the presidential
candidate with Mays Gilliam (played by Chris Rock), a quixotic
Washington, DC, alderman who fights for the people, is gerrymandered
("redlined," according the film's jargon) out of
his district, does not have enough money to continue renting
an office or owning a car, and even has his bicycle destroyed
by a passing bus. Arnot's aim is to boost his party's minority
vote, which looms larger each year, so that he can win in four
years on the coattails of an unsuccessful minority candidate.
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At
first, the naïve Gilliam does what he is told by his
political consultants, garnering only about 10 percent
support in the polls. In Chicago, however, he throws away
a prepared speech, cites various injustices, and the audience
echoes his campaign phrase "It Ain't Right!" Gilliam
then picks up support, chooses his more articulate brother
Mitch (played by Bernie Mac), who operates a bailbond business
in Chicago, as his vice presidential running mate, dumps
his campaign advisers (who later beg successfully to return
to work for him, though on his terms), frightens Arnot
about the prospect that his handpicked loser will become
President Gilliam, endures a smear campaign, triumphs in
a debate with the opposing candidate, and wins the election
on the basis of the votes of California (where minorities
comprise the majority). However, there is such a lack of
clarity when Gilliam appears to present real issues that
an opportunity is lost to raise the consciousness of nonvoters
to throw out fat cat incumbents at the polls. Among the
issues that could have been raised with some seriousness
are the fact that too many Americans lack health care insurance
and work two jobs to stay afloat, the money spent on the
war on drugs goes down a rat hole, public education is
underfinanced, foreign policy is unilateralist, and in
general that poor people derive little benefit from government
compared to the rich. With a more coherent screenplay,
Eddie Murphy could have made Head of State
into a major challenge of the political status quo. Writer-director
Rock instead demonstrates his ignorance of political realities
by settling for infrequent cheap laughs (not even cheap
shots), stereotypic politicians and their advisers, and
a promise that a Head of State II may
feature a President Gilliam as an utter fool. As in the
case of Bulworth (1998),
directed by Warren Beatty, the flippant approach of Head
of State to serious
political issues buries the possibility that members of
the public will realize what they must do to save American
democracy from extinction. MH
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