The Campaign

A film about a US political election? In a presidential election year?! Oh Hollywood, you unpredictably topical flirt! Truth be told though, this doesn’t feel like political bandwagoning. Even with the fairly scathing anti capitalist-America premise aside, The Campaign feels pretty poles apart from the real-life machinations of the road to the White House. While not exactly rife with sharp-witted political satire, and serious underlying messages (bar the betrayal of the middle-American ability to be politically blinded by the right words) it does poke just a little fun at the inherent ridiculousness in political campaigning, and raises an inquisitive eyebrow at just how fair the system ever really is.

At heart a political underdog story, the film pitches the camp, unwitting and naïve Marty Huggins (Zach Galifianakis) against Will Ferrell’s selfish, brash and cocky four-term incumbent Congressman Cam Brady. Cue a series of tit-for-tat humiliations and accidental embarrassments (including the flabbergasting ‘can’t-not-watch’ act of punching a baby). And truth be told, that’s a pretty good metaphor to describe the rest of the comedy. In fairness, the film does offer genuine moments of laugh-out-loud goodness, but the sophistication rarely raises its head above the level of dirty jokes or cheap slapstick. Given the title stars, perhaps that shouldn’t be a surprise, but feeling a little bit like ‘Anchorman does politics’ it certainly doesn’t live up to the similar parodical titles of either Ferrell or Galifianakis’ back catalogues.

What on Earth is that guy doing in the background?!

In short, The Campaign is certainly watchable (albeit at some points you wish you weren’t – baby-gate, for instance) but doesn’t feel like the kind of comedy that could sustain a viewer for much longer than it does. The ever-looming “do the right thing” finale does give the story a somewhat predictable feel, but there is certainly enough boundary-pushing done in the rest of the film that the first watch is kept entertaining. The debate is on for any more than that.