Bobcat Goldthwait's new reality-television satire God Bless America, in theaters now, may have been meant as a well-meaning attempt at condemning our superficial culture, but it's hard for us to digest a flim's message when it's being ceremoniously shoved down our throats by the movie's lead characters via bitter, ranting monologues by Joel Murray and Tara Lynne Barr.
It's not even his Aesop's fable approach to storytelling that irritates us most; we just take issue when filmmakers insult our ability to discern a movie's meaning ourselves. We can appreciate a nuanced film with subtle storytelling meant to provoke thought; We can't support a one-dimensional plot that's merely meant as a mouthpiece for the filmmaker's preaching, or worse yet, a contrived morality tale concocted to win Oscars.
Goldthwait wasn't the first filmmaker to underestimate our intelligence, and he probably won't be the last. We're taking a stand against movies that underhandedly sledgehammer us with a message, and don't even have the decency to be frank about their intentions—you know, like Keenen Ivory Wayans was in Don't Be a Menace... was when he bellowed, "MESSAGE!" during particularly preachy monologues. Here are the films that unintentionally took the same obnoxiously obvious approach: The 10 Most Heavy-Handed Message Movies. Consider our lesson learned: We'll never watch these films with an open mind again. After all, you never know what they might try to drop in.
Written by Shanté Cosme (@ShanteCosme)
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