'American Dreamer' is here to ruin Jim Gaffigan for you
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The following is spoiler-free.
If good entertainment takes your emotions for a walk, then American Dreamer is the Olympic steeplechase — or the 400 meter hurdles, if the hurdles were on fire.
Overwrought with queasy panic, Derrick Borte's crime thriller arrived in theaters for a limited release last week to muted fanfare. The film chronicles the dangerous unraveling of one man against the backdrop of an unforgiving city, similar to the Safdie brothers' underappreciated Good Time. It's an uncomfortable watch, but worth every minute.
Jim Gaffigan (aka comedy's favorite father of five) stars as Cam, a family man-turned-kidnapper. Laid off from his job as a tech specialist, Cam is introduced as an unlucky victim of a churning economy, forced to take on the thankless job of rideshare driving to pay alimony and child support to his ex-wife.
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He misses his son, almost as much as his dignity.
It's an uncomfortable watch, but worth every minute.
Through the driving, Cam meets Mazz, a low-level drug dealer played by Robbie Jones (One Tree Hill.) Cam agrees to drive Mazz around town, no questions asked, in return for a few hundred dollars per day. But after some success with the arrangement, Cam begins to perceive Mazz as yet another entitled passenger, devoid of kindness and humanity.
One night, after dropping Mazz off at another location, Cam sneaks into Mazz's home and kidnaps his two-year-old son. To the audience, it's a snap decision made less than 30 minutes into the film. To Cam, it's the realization of a long-held revenge fantasy, with quick-fix financial perks.
Using a burner cell, Cam, unidentified, tells Mazz he'll return his son for $20,000. What follows is best likened to a disturbing Home Alone sequence, as the bumbling Cam piles consequence atop consequence in his efforts to get away with this ill-conceived plot.
A stand-in for consumer culture, a personified criticism of the gig economy, and an unstoppable force of well-intended destruction, Cam is a uniquely flummoxing villain. Gaffigan — who sharpened his acting chops in 2017's Chappaquiddick — delivers a haunting performance, as slippery as it is captivating.
Jones is similarly spectacular, especially in scenes opposite Isabel Arraiza, who plays Mazz's wife Marina.
Each character in this neo-noir nightmare is as sympathetic as they are loathsome. It's a far cry from Gaffigan's typical optimism, and not anywhere near as funny. But as is often the case in comedy, American Dreamer works because it feels true, and bleakly, unapologetically possible.
American Dreamer is available for rent or purchase on iTunes and Amazon Prime Video.
