Canadian Bacon

Infobox Film | name =Canadian Bacon

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caption =U.S. Movie poster for "Canadian Bacon"
director = Michael Moore
producer = Michael Moore
writer = Michael Moore
starring = Alan Alda
John Candy
Bill Nunn
Kevin J. O'Connor
Rhea Perlman
Kevin Pollak
G.D. Spradlin
Rip Torn
music = Elmer Bernstein
Peter Bernstein
cinematography = Haskell Wexler
editing = Michael Berenbaum
Wendey Stanzler
distributor = Gramercy
released = September 22, 1995
runtime = 91 min
language = English
budget = $11 million
imdb_id = 0109370

"Canadian Bacon" is a 1995 comedy/satire, and the only fictional film written, directed and produced by Michael Moore. It was the last film released to star John Candy though it was filmed before "Wagons East!".

Plot

A U.S. president (played by Alan Alda), faced with falling public opinion ratings due to the closure of cold war defense industries, decides to go to war to distract voters from domestic troubles and invigorate the economy, a plan supported by his National Security Advisor Stuart Smiley (played by Kevin Pollak) and General Dick Panzer (Rip Torn). The problem with this plan is that, with the demise of the Soviet Union, there's no one left to go to war with. But some brainstorming by Smiley leads to an attempt to start a cold war with Canada ("everyone hates Canadians"), using media manipulation as the main tool to stoke the passions of the US public. Unfortunately, a local sheriff, Bud B. Boomer (John Candy, a Canadian in real life), in a town along the US/Canada border, takes it a bit further.

Cast

*Alan Alda as The President
*John Candy as Sheriff Bud B. Boomer
*Rhea Perlman as Deputy Honey
*Kevin Pollak as National Security Advisor Stuart Smiley
*Rip Torn as General Dick Panzer
*Kevin J. O'Connor as Roy Boy
*Bill Nunn as Kabral Jabar
*G. D. Spradlin as R. J. Hacker
*James Belushi as Charles Jackal
*Wallace Shawn as Canadian Prime Minister Clark MacDonald

Production

The movie was filmed in Toronto, Hamilton, Buffalo, Niagara Falls, NY and Niagara Falls, Ontario. Scenes depicting the rapids of the Niagara River were actually filmed at Twelve Mile Creek in St. Catharines. The Parkwood Estate in Oshawa was the site for the White House, and Dofasco in Hamilton was the site for Hacker Dynamics. The scene where the American characters look longingly home at the US across the putative Niagara River is, in fact, them looking across Burlington Bay at Stelco steelworks in Hamilton, Ontario.cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/List?endings=on&&locations=Hamilton,+Ontario,+Canada |title=Internet Movie Database - List of Films shot in Hamilton, Ontario|accessdate=2008-01-29] The hockey game and subsequent riot was shot at the Niagara Falls Memorial Arena in Niagara Falls, Ontario,cite web|url=http://www.nflibrary.ca/nfplindex/show.asp?id=100159&b=1 |title=Rhea Pearlman at the Niagara Falls Arena During the Filming of Canadian Bacon|accessdate=2008-04-10] and the actors portraying the police officers (who eventually join in the riot upon hearing that Canadian beer "sucks") are wearing authentic Niagara Regional Police uniforms.cite web|url=http://www.nflibrary.ca/nfplindex/show.asp?id=100160&b=1 |title=John Candy at the Niagara Falls Arena During the Filming of Canadian Bacon|accessdate=2008-04-10] The film has a notably high number of cameos by Canadian actors. As an example, Dan Aykroyd, who is Canadian, appears in the movie uncredited as an Ontario Provincial Police officer. He stops Sheriff Boomer's truck which has anti-Canadian graffiti painted on it in English and lets Boomer and his "heroes" go after the truck has been spraypainted with the graffiti translated into French. This scene was filmed along the Niagara Parkway in Niagara-on-the-Lake, north of Niagara Falls, Ontario.

*Oliver North appears at the end in a photograph with Stuart Smiley as the newly-elected president.
*The sequences in the American President's war room are strongly influenced by Stanley Kubrick's black comedy "".
*Director Moore appears in a fake news broadcast as one of a group of redneck, gun-toting Americans ready to go to war against Canada. One of his lines is "It's time we put the 'America' back in 'North America'!". He also appears later in the movie driving a pickup truck.
*The end credits state that no Canadians were harmed during the making of the movie, and thank Johnny La Rue for the opening helicopter shot of Horseshoe Falls. This is a reference to a running gag on SCTV where LaRue (a character played by John Candy) famously went over budget for his talk show ("Street Beef") by insisting on ending the show with a long shot from a rented helicopter. The credits say: "Johnny La Rue, you finally got your crane shot".
*The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) are sometimes called the RMPC and the Royal Mounted Canadian Police (RMCP) in this movie.
*One scene where anti-Canadian propaganda is shown on US TV has pictures of well known Canadian actors in the US including William Shatner, Mike Myers, Monty Hall, Michael J. Fox, and Alex Trebek.

ee also

*"Dr. Strangelove"
*"The Mouse that Roared"
*"The Canadian Conspiracy", a 1986 fictional documentary about how Canadian entertainers are conquering TV and movies in the United States.
*"Wag the Dog", a 1997 film about a war devised for similar reasons
*"Canadian Idiot", a parody of Green Days "American Idiot", by "Weird Al" Yankovic, which explores similar themes, and actually mentions the idea of a "preemptive Strike" against Canada.
*"A Speculative Fiction", a song by Canadian band Propagandhi that explores a war between Canada and the U.S.

References

External links

*imdb title|id=0109370|title=Canadian Bacon
* [http://bventertainment.go.com/tv/buenavista/ebertandroeper/index2.html?sec=6&subsec=Canadian+Bacon Ebert & Roeper Film Review] (Flash Video)