Review of American Movie (1999) by Jason D — 15 Feb 2009

American Movie is the documentary film about a Midwestern "filmmaker" Mark Borchardt, whose been obsessed with filmmaking all of his life but has never been able to finish his pictures. In the initial setup of the film, his plight to direct his labor of love, Northwestern, is stalled due to financial constraints and therefore, Mark and his band of family (including his Swedish mother, his kids, and his 80-some odd years old, incoherent grandfather) and friends (including the scene stealing and very hilarious Mike Schank) set out to make his short horror film Coven to make money.

This documentary is so authentic and so hilarious that for the first hour, I honestly thought this was all fake and a mockumentary. Truth be told, Mark Borchardt is a real person. His brutal inability to pull together all he could to make this god damn short movie was so insane that I really, genuinely thought this was all fake.

Mark Borchardt is an amazing character and I truly wanted him to succeed. Even amidst all his sometimes nonsesical ideas and abundant alcoholism, I knew there was someone there with a lot of will and heart.

I kept watching this film and felt bad for Borchardt and his increasingly amusing and sporadic problems until the surprisingly heartwarming and uplifting ending. Great film. I'm sad it took so long for me to finally watch this.

Very good.