The Subversive Action Movie
Popular musicians like Public Enemy, Rage Against The Machine, Bruce Springsteen, and the young Bob Dylan, have garnered the support of major record labels and have subsequently been able to bring very radical political analyses into mainstream US culture. In a similar vein, with the support of big media, exciting action movies like The Bourne Ultimatum have been able to present scathing critiques of the status quo to mainstream audiences that simply enjoy a good action movie.
Along with the previously mentioned films, two other post 9-11 spy thrillers are highly recommended. The 2007 film Shooter, starring Mark Wahlberg and Danny Glover, is based on the book Point of Impact, about the fictional ex-Marine sniper Bob Lee Swagger, written by The Washington Post film critic Stephen Hunter. Interestingly, in the beginning of Shooter, the disaffected Swagger (played by Wahlberg) is seen viewing the prominently displayed the radical-activist Znet website. After Glover’s character talks him into doing one last favor for the government, Swagger is double-crossed, and proceeds to use his Marine skills to hunt down the private military contractors and politicians who skillfully framed him for a murder that he didn’t commit.
The 2004 version of the 1962 movie, The Manchurian Candidate, starring Denzel Washington and Meryl Streep, is a riveting critique of the post-911 climate of fear-mongering, the power of transnational corporations like Haliburton, and the chilling real-life history of experiments in mind-control similar to the CIA’s MK-Ultra program.
Check them out!
--Hans Bennett (insubordination.blogspot.com) is an independent photo-journalist and co-founder of Journalists for Mumia (Abu-Jamal-News.com).
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