'Man of the Year' has a lot of ideas thrown into a glass bowl. We see all those ideas through the glass, and then some are picked out. Some of them turn out to be too hot (or actually hard) to handle so they are thrown back. We are left with an unsatisfying movie which could have been a great satire, a funny comedy, a weird romantic film, or maybe even a working thriller (although I do doubt that).
Robin Williams is Tom Dobbs, a host of a television show not unlike Jon Stewart's 'The Daily Show'. He runs for president as an independent in only thirteen states, wins in all of those, and gets enough votes to become the next president of the USA. I would say, take it from there. But then it is apparently necessary for Eleanor Green (Laura Linney) to discover the computer voting system had a glitch which caused Dobbs to win. Nothing was done about that for financial reasons. It also throws in cigarettes, or at least what it can cause. Christopher Walken takes care of that part.
That 'Man of the Year' never finds its focus is not really my problem. But that the film therefore becomes a waste of time kind of is. Robin Williams has the opportunity for improvising and great one-liners, but none of them delivers. His jokes are too much on the territory of a teen comedy, often close to annoying. The thriller part enters with Linney who wants to tell Dobbs about the glitch, and Jeff Goldblum desperately trying to prevent that. It all seems silly.
The film should have followed the "Oprah for President" storyline, without any computer glitch. Since popular faces on television are actually able to win elections, why not have some fun with that. The trailer showed something I was really looking forward to, the film itself is something I have seen before, only better. That said, the jokes in 'The Daily Show' are a lot better than the those heard in the fictional program in this film. Even if you don't like 'The Daily Show' you will see that. The show and this film have Lewis Black in common. They should have had some of the writers in common.
Robin Williams is Tom Dobbs, a host of a television show not unlike Jon Stewart's 'The Daily Show'. He runs for president as an independent in only thirteen states, wins in all of those, and gets enough votes to become the next president of the USA. I would say, take it from there. But then it is apparently necessary for Eleanor Green (Laura Linney) to discover the computer voting system had a glitch which caused Dobbs to win. Nothing was done about that for financial reasons. It also throws in cigarettes, or at least what it can cause. Christopher Walken takes care of that part.
That 'Man of the Year' never finds its focus is not really my problem. But that the film therefore becomes a waste of time kind of is. Robin Williams has the opportunity for improvising and great one-liners, but none of them delivers. His jokes are too much on the territory of a teen comedy, often close to annoying. The thriller part enters with Linney who wants to tell Dobbs about the glitch, and Jeff Goldblum desperately trying to prevent that. It all seems silly.
The film should have followed the "Oprah for President" storyline, without any computer glitch. Since popular faces on television are actually able to win elections, why not have some fun with that. The trailer showed something I was really looking forward to, the film itself is something I have seen before, only better. That said, the jokes in 'The Daily Show' are a lot better than the those heard in the fictional program in this film. Even if you don't like 'The Daily Show' you will see that. The show and this film have Lewis Black in common. They should have had some of the writers in common.