Rent The Decline of the American Empire (1986)

Less Revelation Than Admin - The Decline of the American Empire review by griggs

Films about friends talking — really talking, messily, about sex and marriage and regret — can be electrifying. This isn’t one of those films.

The title isn’t wrong: instant gratification has helped rot plenty of civilisations from within. But The Decline of the American Empire can’t do much with that idea beyond staging an endless relay of oversexed bores swapping anecdotes in a gym and a country house kitchen. Some of it amuses; little of it convinces. The flashbacks seem to be reaching for tragicomedy, but land nowhere near either.

These are academics, remember. We’re clearly meant to watch their “enlightened” posturing collapse into appetite in a blazer. The trouble is, when no one earns a flicker of genuine interest, the unmasking feels less like revelation than admin.

Then there’s the film’s sole gay character, whose contribution includes peeing blood, musing on the bodies of young boys, and treating AIDS risk as part of the erotic appeal. The film presents this without much visible discomfort. That tells you something.

Decline, indeed.