American Dharma

An exquisitely made documentary, in which Errol Morris gives Steve Bannon just enough rope to hang himself. No doubt many would prefer to see Bannon more thoroughly and decisively skewered (which wouldn't be hard), but Bannon is smart enough not to participate with any documentarian who would do that. Instead, Bannon engages with Morris and collaborates all-too-willingly with his conceit of drawing parallels between Bannon's political machinations and his favourite Hollywood classics. The approach neatly underscores Bannon's essential narcissism, while giving him a framework within which he can both expound his political views and reveal himself, both proudly and inadvertently. As the consequences of this current wave of populism - and, more specifically, Trumpism - continue to unfold and blight the world, American Dharma is likely to become an increasingly important document of one of the movement's most important architects. With Trump now defeated (at least electorally) Morris probably needs to re-visit Bannon for his more unvarnished views on the presidency he engineered. Maybe they could call it Dharma and Dumber.

Seen at idfa 2018. The description on the idfa site got me really curious into this movie. However in my opinion the film did not deliver the promise of being "an horror story about a fascinating villan, too dangerous to ignore". However that may be actually true, this film did not leave that decision up to the viewer. And though it was beautifully crafted, it was overdone. To me the film felt artificial and thus had not the impact it could have.

Errol Morris is a weasel. He was face to face with Bannon for 17 hours, but waits until AFTER he gets bad reviews to badmouth him.

The movie centers around Bannon's favorite movies, including "Sergeant York" and others, and how they revolve around the Trump 2016 Campaign, but also how he got started, and why he thinks the way he does... Definitely worth the $3.99, and I'm cheap!

I gave a 7 because it's always a good thing to have people like S Bannon on record, but overall I found the interview quite weak as Errol Morris is sometimes simply disagreeing or being outraged but does not bring any facts or arguments into the mix.

Interesting to see how Bannon had no credible defense argument for Charlottesville, the Alt-Right, and the role of Breitbart in giving a voice to hate. I think he just does not care of the consequences; the end justifies the means.

I found remarkable that the role of Bannon at Cambridge Analytica was not mentioned (except for a newspaper title that appears half a second on the screen).

Bannon is a man with a mission - an evil, dangerous mission that is. He does not care about the deplorables, the men in the trenches, they are just a tool.

Bannon is consumed by power, and will piggy back any useful idiot/populist that will help speed up the coming of a self-realizing apocalyptic prophecy.

A debut of American Dharma in North America was released in Toronto Film Festival when I firstly saw it. It's a great chance to to hear what the director's opinion about Bannon, the role of this documentary, who was the executive operator of an American media and famous for being Trump's advisor during his campaign. Although the movie describes Bannon objectively, the director seems has nothing in common with Bannon's stand points and feels some kind of unacceptable about some thoughts such as Bannon compare his departure from Trumps' team to Lucifer in Paradise Lost. Actually, this documentary is an epitome of 2016 Trump's presidential election period. What makes me feel curious is the reason why Bannon compares himself to honey badger.