Jamie
Canadian Bacon was a real staple of cable. It’s hard to even figure how many times I saw the movie… I’m sure it felt like a lot more than it actually was. That’s why I was so shocked when Patrick (to our dismay) revealed that it didn’t qualify for BMT. It never really got a substantial US release. It seems impossible. But it’s the truth. What is also the truth is that understanding what “qualified” means for 80’s and early 90’s films can be a fraught endeavor. Sometimes you have to stand back and look at a film and think “is this BMT?” Was Two Much not a BMT film? Was Swept Away, the worst film ever made, not BMT? We have previously answered in the negative to this, but I think we probably erred slightly. Those certainly don’t seem like “friends,” and neither does Canadian Bacon. Directed by Michael Moore, starring John Candy, and made for $11 million dollars. It played gangbusters on cable for a reason. That reason is that it’s probably BMT, so we’ll let this one slide… this time.
To recap, after being laid off from a recently closed weapons factory, Bud B. Boomer has used his family connections to become Sheriff of Niagara Falls. While he spends his time fishing the suicidal former factory workers from the falls with the help of his girlfriend(?) Honey, the President of the United States is trying to figure out how to get reelected. Turns out having extended peacetime has been no good for the military industrial complex and that’s no good for him. They need a war, and fast! When they catch Boomer and his friends brawling at a cross-border hockey game they get the bright idea to set up a false flag “Canadian” operation targeting the Niagara power plant. Boomer and his friends are incensed and plan a counter operation to drop garbage across the border. Unfortunately, Honey is caught. The President isn’t sweating it (in fact he’s loving it), that is until Boomer heads into Canada to rescue Honey and leaves a trail of petty crimes in his wake. They send special forces in to stop Boomer, but are surprised when it appears that Canada has taken control of US nukes and aimed them at Moscow. In reality the owner of the recently closed weapons factory is tired of this fake war and wants a real war. He has hacked into the weapons system and made it look like Canada is creating the war. Everyone is panicking. Even more so when the weapons maker is killed and the only other person in on the ruse is arrested. Meanwhile, Boomer and Honey come together at the CN Tower where the weapon is being housed. Honey sees that the machines are made by the company that laid them off and in a fit of rage destroys them just before all the nukes are launched. They save the day and the world. THE END.
Canadian Bacon is a more ramshackle production than I remember. Definitely feels like a film made by a documentarian. That being said, John Candy is very good in it (as are some of the actors doing cameos) and there are some very funny scenes in the first ⅔ of the film. It’s incredibly prescient, as well, which speaks to Moore’s understanding of the political environment of the time. You almost would think he made the film in the early 2000’s given some of the subject matter. Ultimately, they couldn’t quite land the plane, though. They seemed to really want a Dr. Strangelove moment at the end, but it doesn’t work. Feels like an 80’s comedy by the time it finishes. I can see why I liked it as a kid, though… similar to Strange Brew. Not everything hits, but when it does it’s very funny.
Hot Take Clam Bake! Of all the things mentioned in the epilogue the one I buy the least is Oliver North becoming President in the next election… particularly in the alleged landslide indicated. Ollie North? Landslide? I don’t think so. He was super controversial at the time. He lost a close Senate election in 1994 almost entirely because an Independent candidate tried to jump in to play to the center of him. Now if you told me he got a surprise nomination and ultimately squeaked out a victory against a weak incumbent… sure. But a landslide? The Iran-Contra guy? I don’t buy it. I’d buy Boomer’s friend becoming an NHL legend before I bought that. Hot Take Temperature: Hellfire.
Patrick?
Patrick
‘Ello everyone! What are we talking about? Are we talking about John Candy invading Canada and Michael Moore almost torpedoing his documentary career? Let’s go!
Ah Canadian Bacon. We are really on a role with films we’ve seen before. And in a way I’m reminding myself of all the things we’ve been missing from the classic BMTs of yesteryear.
Remember like … Dutch angles? There was a whole thing with that in the first year of BMT. We couldn’t watch a thriller without seeing loads of Dutch angles! It was a wild time.
There is just something charming about the three prior movies. TMNT II and III are really a nonsensical smorgasbord of films designed solely to sell toys to me and Jamie. Eddie is an odd type of comedy fashioned out of how a few people thought basketball worked (possibly without having watched basketball in their lives). And The Animal was that early 2000s borderline gross-out comedy where getting the 6th place person on a reality show was considered a boon. All of them are truly and profoundly bizarre historical relics.
Canadian Bacon is that film you watched on television where you’d never have ever considered seeing it, but then it is just on all the time for free. It isn’t really funny, but it has a bunch of funny people in it, and you eventually go “oh Kevin Pollack! From Willow” and maybe you’d remember he was also in Canadian Bacon.
But really you’d never remember he was in Canadian Bacon. The film is very charming. It is really just very very poorly made. Everything you think of when you think of how a movie is stitched together (like B-roll footage, and a narrative structure) is totally missing and replaced by something a college student could put together. Meanwhile John Candy is still killing it, and the story has a mostly interesting satire underlying it.
This was, somehow, the follow-up to Roger & Me and legitimately seemed to almost destroy Michael Moore’s career. Also it didn’t actually qualify, but who cares, it is a wide release in our hearts.
What else … Rhea Perlman is over the top, but fun. And honestly Alan Alda is hilarious as the nincompoop president. Really the acting is top notch, the comedy hits on occasion, but it is all let down by everything being encased within a non-film.
I do think Roy Boy is a Planchet (Who?), his character’s function is just to screw up and get dunked on. Obviously must give a Product Placement (What?) shoutout to Molson and all the other awesomely Canadian things, like Ontario, the sportsman’s paradise. Let’s get that A+ Setting (Where?) for Canada, but in reality, this is a fantastic Niagara Falls film. And this I think is closest to BMT, it is a very very weird film and somehow manages to escape its non-qualification to become a big film.
Read about my Canadian Bacon sequel in the Quiz. Cheerios,
The Sklogs
Bad Movie Twins 