When Benedict Arnold (Andy Sandburg) sabotages the signing of the Declaration of Independence, killing the founding fathers, he later lures Geroge Washington (Channing Tatum) and Abraham Lincoln (Will Forte) to Ford's theater where he uses his werewolf powers to kill Abe. While George is initially despondent, he eventually decides to put together a team consisting of figures such as Thomas Edison (Olivia Munn), Samuel Adams (Jason Mantzoukas), Paul Revere (Bobby Moynihan) and Geronimo (Raoul Trujillo) to take down the tyrannical King James (Simon Pegg) and establish the nation of America.
America The Motion Picture, a joint production between Lord Miller Productions, Netflix Animation, and Floyd County Productions has a lot of proven talent both behind and in front of the camera. With a cast and crew that have worked on everything from Archer, 21 and 22 Jump Street, Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse and many other successful ventures in combination with an intriguing high concept premise, this was a movie I was honestly anticipating since its announcement in 2017. Unfortunately despite having all the right pieces, the movie is less than the sum of its parts.
The animation in the film is at least decent with good use of perspective, appealing character and environmental designs, and fluid movements and expressions that make the visuals really pop. In terms of its technical aspects you'd be hard pressed to find a film of this type that looks this nice.
The writing and performances are unfortunately where the movie falters. America The Motion Pictures primary joke is in taking the American Revolution and cramming in all manner of anachronistic references and persons and framing it as if it were a blockbuster action film. Watching America The Motion Picture I found myself comparing it to Drunk History which would also take historical events and play them in increasingly ludicrous directions at the whims of the inebriated host. America The Motion Picture has enough material for a five minute Youtube sketch or maybe 22 minutes of a TV episode, but at 90 minutes it becomes all too obvious the material is not strong enough to sustain feature length as it rests on its basic premise as the beginning and end of the joke. The performances are also not very good as they have a very self aware approach to the material with many of characters feeling like interchangeable "frat bro" types whose only purpose is to spout contemporary references solely for their own sake including head scratching references to the long dormant Jason Statham Transporter series and Lorenzo Lamas Renegade TV show.
America The Motion Picture takes a moderately intriguing premise and does virtually nothing with it, while the animation is fluid with appealing designs they're unfortunately in service of played out rambling reference heavy humor that is so lacking in context, set up, or payoff that the movie just ambles aimlessly between comic setpieces with no sense of comic friction or pacing.
