For the last 50 years or so – roughly since John F. Kennedy started campaigning for Presidential office in 1959 – to be a celebrity in America is to be a political figure. George Clooney's political obsessions, ideals and acts are important in the public eye, as is the fact that President Obama receives text messages from him. This is by no means a new concept and when Arnold Schwarzenegger took office in 2003, despite some expected heckles and critiques, it seemed like a logical next step in our elevation of celebrity worship. In the new documentary Videocracy, we are revealed as sober and somewhat prude in our worship in the face of the ruling cult of personality in Italy. Where we would simply gawk at a photo of Ted Turner arm-in-arm with Jane Fonda, Italy has seen fit to elect Silvio Berlusconi, Turner's Roman equivalent, as Prime Minister under the moderate-right People of Freedom party. The film begins with footage from an early quiz show where people asked questions and were awarded by a masked woman dancing in her underwear and Berlusconi's concept of broadcasting is hardly more evolved. In comparison, Jersey Shore looks like something that might appear at Lincoln Center. Framed by excerpts from an admirer (victim?) of Berlusconi's media empire, a young man who imitates Ricky Martin, lives with his mother and dreams of becoming the Italian Jean-Claude Van Damme, Videocracy spreads itself thin as it sets out on the well-treaded mission of revealing the depravity of the public's obsession with fame. The Prime Minister's posturing grin purveys the landscape of the film but the director Erik Gandini eventually comes to study a far more dangerous animal. Linked by mogul-agent Lele Mora, Fabrizio Corona and Berlusconi are of the same breed but Corona was incubated in what Berlusconi simply created; he is hyper-aware of public reaction and of the camera, never missing a chance to pose for fans, women or Gandini. Ultimately the filmmaker fails to fully immerse the viewer in his country's hunger for the pleasures of fame but his film exerts a primal fascination and is haunting when it focuses on Corona. Arrested, investigated and jailed for any number of extortion plots and acts of blatant fraudulency, the Catania native is at once a seductive and grotesque force to behold, whether hypnotized by the sight of his own body or spewing bitter bile about the people who worship him. His manipulation is ubiquitous and when he fields a question about running for office, your marrow freezes. But Gandini, perhaps conflicted by simultaneous feelings of disgust and arousal for Corona, continually returns to Berlusconi and yet never takes the time to show how the Prime Minister grew and how he built his epitome of vapidity. Rather, he relies on a familiar tactic of saturating the screen with the endgame: Naïve men and women dancing and performing in the hopes of never having to work at anything but their looks for the rest of their lives. The tone and music denote horror but there is a slight irony in that the same women that populate Berlusconi's vision for Italy are seen throughout Videocracy.