Anti-Obama Documentary Scores at Box Office

The conservative anti-Obama documentary “2016: Obama’s America” performed well in its opening weekend, taking in $2.2 million to make it the top-grossing documentary film of the year and putting it in the eighth spot for the weekend.

So what exactly is the movie about?

Here’s The Huffington Post’s take:

“2016: Obama’s America” is based on Indian-American conservative author Dinesh D’Souza’s book, “The Roots of Obama’s Rage.” (D’Souza also co-directed with John Sullivan, and narrates the majority of the film). A poster for the movie shows a profile of President Obama cast against a hazy gray fog with the tag line, “Love Him, Hate Him, You Don’t Know Him.”

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And this is how Gawker described it:

Judging from the trailer, which comes complete with a terrific spy-movie techno-“Middle Eastern music” soundtrack, here are some of its themes:

— Barack Obama is a Bad Man — He is from Africa — He hates America — Black people love to play Monopoly and fight with each other

That is Obama’s America, in 2016: fighting colonialism by playing Monopoly. Scary.

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One thing the documentary is not about, however, is birtherism.

As Slate’s Dave Weigel, who reviewed (i.e., actually watched) the film last month wrote:

Twenty minutes into a new conservative documentary about Barack Obama, there’s a moment that’ll break a birther’s heart. Dinesh D’Souza, the star and narrator of 2016: Obama’s America, is telling the brief, encyclopedia-entry version of the president’s life. The camera zooms over a map like one of the travel scenes in Raiders of the Lost Ark—Kenya, Indonesia, Hawaii.

“On August 4, 1961,” says D’Souza, “Barack Obama II is born in the Kapiolani Medical Center in Honolulu. His birth is recorded in two local newspapers.”

… There are no conspiracy theories about Obama’s birth, religion, Social Security number, passport, or college transcript. Instead, there is a deep dive into Barack Obama’s known Communist associates, his late father’s avowed socialism, and his mother’s radicalism.

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Watch two trailers for the film below:

Trailer 1:

Trailer 2: