America: Imagine the World without Her
Film Review by Kam Williams
Revisionist Documentary Speculates about Alternative U.S. Reality
What would the U.S. look like today if the Minutemen had lost the Revolutionary War to England? That query is the launching pad of America: Imagine the World without Her, an unapologetically right-wing documentary written, directed and narrated by Dinesh D’Souza.
D’Souza, a political pundit who immigrated here as a teenager back in the Seventies, proudly wears his patriotism on his sleeve, announcing at the outset, “I love America! I chose this country!” before launching into a full-frontal attack on such controversial left-leaning leaders and public intellectuals as Reverend Jeremiah Wright, Ward Churchill, Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, Elizabeth Warren, Michael Eric Dyson, Bill Ayers, Howard Zinn, Saul Alinsky and Hillary Clinton.
But he levels his most caustic remarks at Barack Obama whom he indicts as a liar by playing a number of incriminating comments from “If you want to keep your doctor, you can keep your doctor” to “Nobody is listening to your phone calls.” D’Souza goes on to explain the President’s behavior as merely part of a strategic socialist conspiracy to destroy the capitalist system.
The movie is basically an attempt to prove that the United States is a great nation with no reason to be ashamed of its past, as suggested by its supposed detractors like Reverend Wright who is heard again in his most notorious sound bite, “No! No! No! Not God bless America… God damn America!” D’Souza brushes aside shameful chapters in our history like slavery and the slaughter of the Indians by arguing that there were just as many black slave owners as white ones, and that Native Americans had fought with each other for millennia prior to the arrival of European settlers.
His goal is to inspire the masses to rise up and save the country before it’s too late. I suspect that the picture will serve as red meat to arch-conservatives already inclined to dismiss Obama and other progressives as communists in liberals’ clothing. Unfortunately, it also won’t do much to encourage civil discourse or to bridge the intractable stalemate between Democratic and Republicans sitting on opposite sides of the aisle.
Divisive D’Souza: Imagine an America without him!
Fair (1.5 stars)
Rated PG-13 for violent images
Running time: 104 minutes
Distributor: Lionsgate Films
To see a trailer for America: Imagine the World without Her, visit:
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