FILM-USA: ‘We won. America. Good over evil.’

By Jim Lobe Reprint | | Print |

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Aug 13 1996 (IPS) - Since its independence 220 years ago, the United States has never wavered in its conviction that it has a mission to perform, divinely ordained and global in scope.

The precise nature of that mission has changed over the years. In its secular form, it has traditionally had to do with spreading the blessings of democracy and free enterprise, whether by example or by force.

But the mission has also had an overriding moral and redemptive purpose: to save the world — from monarchy and autocracy, from European imperialism, from fascism, from communism and revolution, and other sins.

Now, on the eve of the millennium, with some traditional enemies having become friends and other intractable ones rendered less threatening by geopolitical alterations, the American sense of mission appears to have taken a gigantic celestial leap.

Judging by this summer’s box-office figures, aliens are the new threat. And once again, the United States is in the forefront. The movie ‘Independence Day’, which cost a mere 70 million dollars to make, has grossed more than 230 million dollars since its release on….(yes!) the Fourth of July, is more than a box office it. The movie fits a pattern.

Both Hollywood and the foreign-policy establishment alike have tried gamely to convince the public of the plausibility of a new global threat following the end of the Cold War. Terrorism — especially of the Arab variety — has been involved; drug trafficking; even exotic viruses to scare the public into the theatres. None has shown real staying power.

Enter Independence Day, a techno-razzle-dazzle thriller that has already been heartily endorsed by Republican presidential candidate Robert Dole as wholesome, family entertainment, and a celebration of “American values”. Prominent right-wing columnists have raved about it. And the movie has already become part of the 1996 presidential election campaign.

Just as the film’s box office lustre appeared on the wane, it received a fillip: American scientists gathered the press last week to proclaim that science fiction was not that fictional — that there was, indeed, evidence of life on the planet Mars, though the evidence was not conclusive.

The plot for Independence Day is as thin as a comic book. The Earth is surrounded by huge alien ships of apparently malign intent. They hover over the capitals and major cities on all continents, blotting out the sun and invoking fear and terror among the masses.

These diabolical machines have not come in peace. They destroy helicopters sent up by the White House to communicate. And peaceniks who gather to welcome the aliens on the tops of buildings are the first to be obliterated by a laser-like weapon which annihilates whole cities. In the United States alone, New York, Washington, and Los Angeles — with a total population of about 25 million people — are consumed in fiery holocausts.

The fate of the world now rests with three men — a sassy African-American fighter pilot (Will Smith), a brilliant but unambitious Jewish-American nerd (Jeff Goldblum), and a determined white Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP) U.S. president (Bill Pullman).

These three are so cool under fire that the annihilation of hundreds of millions of people around the world, including the citizens of three major U.S. cities, never gets them down.

While all three have special talents, the president is truly exceptional. Not only is he decisive and tough, he also flew warplanes in the Gulf War. “I’m a combat pilot, Bill,” he tells his craggy armed forces chief before leading his forces into the final battle against the alien ships. “I belong in the air.”

And not only can he fly, but he also has the uncanny ability to visualise the intentions of the aliens. It turns out they’re like “locusts” moving from planet to planet to extract natural resources, killing all in their path.

“Let’s nuke the bastards,” the president tells his aides in what has to be one of the movie’s more wholesomely macho messages.

But how? That’s where Smith and Goldblum come in. Goldblum, the Jewish techno-wizard supplies the brains, while Smith, the black pilot, offers the physical acumen and talent to get the job done. No stereotypes in this movie!

(The fourth and somewhat lesser hero in the film is the single alcoholic father of a Chicano family. A pilot shot down during the Vietnam War, he firmly believes he was abducted and sexually abused by space aliens at an earlier time and now hopes to “pay back” his kidnappers.)

These heroes, led by their president and backed by the combined might of U.S. air forces, win the day against the alien invaders and free the world — nay, the very universe — from destruction. All on U.S. Independence Day, the Fourth of July.

And the rest of the world? It seems all the other nations have been waiting for the U.S. to show the way. Cameo appearances by European and Japanese pilots, and even Arabs and Israeli pilots (bizarrely united by a British officer to fight the aliens) remind the viewer that other countries exist.

Referring to a secret message he has received, a Russian officer tells his mate, “It’s from the Americans. They want to organise (an attack).” Global harmony is achieved behind the old Red, White and Blue.

But that’s about it for the foreigners, except after the final battle when we see brief flashes of jubilant, spear-bearing Africans and camel-riding Arabs celebrating Earth’s deliverance.

But if foreigners don’t play much of a role in saving the world, women have slightly less to complain about.

Each of the three main male heroes actually has a relationship with a woman to whom he is devoted, and each of the women actually works outside the home: The First Lady is an independent sort; Jeff Goldblum takes up with a former flame who happens to be the president’s chief of staff; And Will Smith’s girlfriend is a single mother and a nightclub stripper with a heart of gold. (Don’t worry: Smith marries her in a triumph of family values.)

And that’s what’s so great about the good old USA. WASPs, Jews, blacks and Hispanics; rich and poor; drunks and teetotalers; civilians and soldiers: if we all are engaged in a common struggle, if we all bring our individual talents to the common fight, if we can just find a common enemy against whom we can unite, nothing will stop us. Not even three-metre-high spacemen with ten-metre-long tentacles.

“We can’t be consumed by our petty differences anymore,” declares the president as he takes command of his airborne armada.

Dole, the Republican Party’s likely candidate for the White House, said of Independence Day: “I like it. We won; the end. Leadership. America. Good over evil.”