Bob Roberts

Bob Roberts (1992) is a political mockumentary you can watch online on iFILM, written, directed by and starring Tim Robbins. A wealthy conservative candidate fires up rally crowds with acoustic folk music — only his lyrics push hard-right economics and social policy instead of the protest tradition he's borrowing the form from.

Giancarlo Esposito plays the reporter who keeps asking inconvenient questions. Alan Rickman is the incumbent liberal senator losing not an argument but an entire political moment. Gore Vidal shows up as himself, and one lifted eyebrow says more than a speech. James Spader, David Strathairn and Helen Hunt fill a cast that took the project seriously.

Robbins shoots the whole thing in the manner of a campaign documentary — observational, apparently neutral. The satire lives in the gap between what Bob Roberts says and what the camera quietly shows. Made in 1992; the rhythms it describes did not stay in 1992. Stream Bob Roberts online on iFILM.