Canadian Bacon

In this episode of Sweater Weather, Aaron starts off by telling some jokes about the Canadian election: Who would fictional Canadian characters vote for? What should you do now that the GST on first homes is gone? Naomi laughs politely. Then we talk about Canadian Bacon, the 1995 film from director Michael Moore, starring John Candy, Rhea Perlman, and Alan Alda, a satire about an American president who declares war on Canada to boost his approval ratings. We liked many of the film's gags poking fun at Canada and Canadian stereotypes, but the real focus of the film is US culture and politics, using Canada as kind of liberal fun house mirror to reflect back to itself a more conservative America. Of course, it's what you'd expect from the famously liberal documentary filmmaker Michael Moore, who only ever made one fictional film, this one. Whether you like the movie or not, the satire turned out to be shockingly prescient, given what's going on in 2025, with a Trump-led trade war against Canada that has inflamed nationalistic sentiment on both sides of the border. Despite all the goofs and gaffs, Aaron found the film oddly disturbing for the dark picture it paints in which everyone is either evil or an idiot, while Naomi didn't seem so put off by that. To be fair, Aaron also napped through the middle third of the film, so he couldn't have been that disturbed. We hope this episode of Sweater Weather doesn't put you to sleep--unless you listen to podcasts in bed while trying to drift off to dreamland. In that case, bon nuit, and enjoy! Sweater Weather podcast (Video): https://www.youtube.com/@aarongiovannone  Sweater Weather podcast (Audio): https://pod.link/1547081850  Naomi's website: https://www.naomiklewis.com/  Naomi on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/na.oh.mee  Naomi on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/naomiklewis  Aaron's website: https://www.aarongiovannone.com  Aaron on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aaron.giovannone  Aaron on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@aarongiovannone  Aaron on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AaronGiovannoneAuthor/  Aaron on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@aarongiovannone  Aaron on X: https://x.com/SincerityCity