Hillary: The Movie may or may not be coming to a theater near you, depending on whether the conservative think-tank that made it believes the film’s worth even a limited release if the candidate is out of the running for the presidency. The movie already suffered a serious setback when the Federal Election Commission and a panel of judges ruled that producers couldn’t air trailers without significant edits and disclaimers, as though the clips were in fact campaign ads. It’s the movie the FEC doesn’t want you to see! What you might not know just yet is that it’s the movie your brain doesn’t want you to see, either.
It’s no spoiler to say that the filmmakers, along with the dozens of pundits, former and current lawmakers, and “real” people who appear in the film, don’t want Clinton to be the next president. Most of them don’t want her to serve in any elected capacity whatsoever, and many think we’d be best served if she was in prison. Fair enough. Michael Moore takes a similar tact in his films, and they’re occasionally interesting to watch—he even won an Oscar for one of them. Hillary: The Movie is not a Michael Moore film.
From the ham-handed soundtrack meant to inspire foreboding to the insipid narrator to the “reenactments” starring a faceless actress with a Halloween wig and an unfairly large ass, this movie skimps on more than mere evidence to support its accusations against Hillary. The best thing that can be said about it is that right-wing talking head Ann Coulter looks like a normal-sized person in it, as opposed to an anorexic stick figure.
Hoping to convince the viewer that Hillary is evil incarnate, the movie scrolls through more than a decade of press clippings and a treasure trove of unflattering pictures in its one-sided romp through (in the following order and among other things): Travelgate; Kathleen Willey; Bill Clinton‘s sex life; Norman Hsu and other Chinese fundraisers; a gala event that violated fundraising rules during her first Senate campaign; her supposed lack of a legislative record as a senator; Hillarycare; Sandy Berger‘s document-swiping; and Bill Clinton’s pardons. The lack of coherent chronology, when combined with the superb hyperbole provided by Coulter, Newt Gingrich, Bay Buchanan (Pat‘s sister and a former Romneyite), and the yellow-toothed Dick Morris makes one question the existence of Hillary’s “right wing conspiracy”—but only because these folks don’t seem coordinated enough to conspire.
If the name of the movie, the express intent of its makers, and this review aren’t enough to keep you from the theater, well, you aren’t voting for her anyway, so why do you care? I strongly recommend viewing it while inebriated in the manner of your choosing, and only if you don’t pay $10 for the privilege.