What It Means to Be an American Parts 1 & 2 (Rifftrax Shorts)

Rifftrax Year:  2009
Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

What It Means to Be an American is one big circlejerk of a short.  Funded by our government, it serves to remind us Americans that we are among the luckiest people in the world for living in a free land.  It can't stress enough the free speech aspect, which is repeated over and over again to the point where you want to exorcise your own right to free speech by shouting "I GET IT, FOR FUCK'S SAKE!"  But it also takes a close look at American family life, work life, schools, and nature, all of which are presented as angelic as possible.  Too bad all of that has gone to shit since this short was produced.

What?  Free speech, motherfucker.

This is the first of several shorts that were split into multi parts for distribution on rifftrax.com.  This was an experiment, probably to not go over the ten minute mark in downloads and/or to try not to charge more than a buck.  Ultimately, they just decided to do longer shorts that cost more in the long run.

What It Means to Be an American is as dry and dull as they come, but the patriotism is full force.  Mike, Kevin, and Bill wisely latch onto that patriotism as the film starts to boast about the greatness of American life, while our riffers love to point out that one (of many) things that cheapens or ruins it.  It's not exactly a counterpoint to the film, but more of a hilarious exception to the rule.

If I were to recommend one part over the other, I'd say I laughed harder during the second half of the short, which makes part two the no-brainer recommend.  That first part more or less builds up steam, while our guys are just chugging along on a winning streak after that.  Plus the short has a lot of fades to black toward the end, which trick our boys into thinking the short is over, only to groan when the pic comes back to life.  I'm always a sucker for those laughs.

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