Terry St
Second Unit
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2002
- Messages
- 393
You make it sound like the entire nation has post-traumatic stress disorder from one terrorist bombing. While truly an unfortunate event, it simply doesn't compare to the devastation to civilian populations seen, within living memory, in countries such as Britain, Germany, Poland, Japan, Serbia, Congo, Vietnam, Korea, ... (The list goes on for a loooong time.) It is true that Americans have been heavily insulated from the tragedy of violence since the civil war, so it is understandably a bit shocking to finally see some of it on your own soil. Still, many other nations have been through a lot worse, but they're still here and still watching popcorn flicks.
Take Japan for example. Can the destruction of the world trade center even begin to compare to Hiroshima or Nagasaki? Japan did not choose to avoid all mention of such disasters in the years that have passed since then. Instead they embraced disaster movies! They took the fear of technological inferiority that rose from the nuclear holocaust and transformed it into a driving force behind their meteoric rise from a devastated near-feudal nation to one of the most technologically advanced industrial nations on the planet. They didn't retreat from the horror they were subjected to. They faced it, overcame it, and drew strength from it. Their cinema continues to reflect this.
The situation in post-war Britain was very similar, but they responded to it very differently. While the Germans never had access to nuclear weapons, the British still experienced mass bombing of civilian centers on a scale no nation in the America's has ever seen. Britain may have emerged from WWII as a sovereign nation, but it could hardly have been considered victorious! The mighty British empire that once spanned the globe is now one small group of islands. Their economy, that once dominated the world, now barely qualifies for G8 membership. Their formerly omnipotent navy had long since become an obsolete joke. After WWII they were faced with pulling a future from the rubble, just like the Japanese, except they only recovered a fraction of what they lost. What was post-war British cinema like? Escapism. Past glories. Anything but the unbearable truth.
Does cinema really influence a nation to a large extent? Failing that, can it even be considered an accurate reflection of a nation's mindset, or does it merely reflect the minds of a greedy few who are only concerned with avoiding box office failures and bad press that might reduce profits? I honestly don't know. The media has treated 9/11 as some kind of cabalistic idol of fear that must be bowed down to and worshiped, but never questioned or analyzed. Hollywood, ever the money grubbers, have given us plenty of "Bridge over the River Kwai" rather than some "Godzilla".
Admittedly it is too soon to jump to conclusions, but still, the apparent lack of mainstream films dealing with Terrorism (and the motivations behind it) is quite concerning. Perhaps they are yet to come? I certainly hope so. While 9/11 is nothing compared to what Britain and Japan went through, the response to it so far suggests that American society may lack the resilience required to recover from true adversity. You can't fight terror by forgetting it. You need to understand it and face it. What better place than the cinema? It may be art, but what is art without meaning?
P.S. If you guys think this post is too political PM me and I will delete it. It was sort of difficult to avoid given the topic though.
Take Japan for example. Can the destruction of the world trade center even begin to compare to Hiroshima or Nagasaki? Japan did not choose to avoid all mention of such disasters in the years that have passed since then. Instead they embraced disaster movies! They took the fear of technological inferiority that rose from the nuclear holocaust and transformed it into a driving force behind their meteoric rise from a devastated near-feudal nation to one of the most technologically advanced industrial nations on the planet. They didn't retreat from the horror they were subjected to. They faced it, overcame it, and drew strength from it. Their cinema continues to reflect this.
The situation in post-war Britain was very similar, but they responded to it very differently. While the Germans never had access to nuclear weapons, the British still experienced mass bombing of civilian centers on a scale no nation in the America's has ever seen. Britain may have emerged from WWII as a sovereign nation, but it could hardly have been considered victorious! The mighty British empire that once spanned the globe is now one small group of islands. Their economy, that once dominated the world, now barely qualifies for G8 membership. Their formerly omnipotent navy had long since become an obsolete joke. After WWII they were faced with pulling a future from the rubble, just like the Japanese, except they only recovered a fraction of what they lost. What was post-war British cinema like? Escapism. Past glories. Anything but the unbearable truth.
Does cinema really influence a nation to a large extent? Failing that, can it even be considered an accurate reflection of a nation's mindset, or does it merely reflect the minds of a greedy few who are only concerned with avoiding box office failures and bad press that might reduce profits? I honestly don't know. The media has treated 9/11 as some kind of cabalistic idol of fear that must be bowed down to and worshiped, but never questioned or analyzed. Hollywood, ever the money grubbers, have given us plenty of "Bridge over the River Kwai" rather than some "Godzilla".
Admittedly it is too soon to jump to conclusions, but still, the apparent lack of mainstream films dealing with Terrorism (and the motivations behind it) is quite concerning. Perhaps they are yet to come? I certainly hope so. While 9/11 is nothing compared to what Britain and Japan went through, the response to it so far suggests that American society may lack the resilience required to recover from true adversity. You can't fight terror by forgetting it. You need to understand it and face it. What better place than the cinema? It may be art, but what is art without meaning?
P.S. If you guys think this post is too political PM me and I will delete it. It was sort of difficult to avoid given the topic though.