Aaron Keith Harris
2007-12-07 08:00:00.0
Current rank: Not ranked

BALTIMORE -

With the Bush Administration approaching its final year and the 2008 presidential election filling up the news cycle, Hollywood is doing its part to shape the debate.

Fortunately, but perhaps not surprisingly, a slate of recent films criticizing the Bush approach to the Iraq War or the War on Terror doesn’t seem to have made much of a difference.

“Lions for Lambs,” starring director Robert Redford as a smug political science professor, Meryl Streep as a wise reporter and Tom Cruise as a campy conservative senator, has made just $15 million domestically since its November release.

Starring the doe-eyed Jake Gyllenhaal as a CIA interrogator with a conscience, “Rendition” isn’t quite as ridiculous as “Lambs,” but has earned just $10 million since October.

“In the Valley of Elah,” which could have been much, much better than the other two, has made about $7 million since September.

In a remarkably strong, subdued performance, Tommy Lee Jones plays a retired military policeman who goes looking for his son, Mike, who has gone AWOL just after returning from Iraq.

He gets little help from the Army or the police, so he pounds the pavement on his own, the grief building in his eyes as he slowly finds out the truth. Unfortunately, the clichés keep piling up, too.

Because the Army need more bodies, it is rife with low-lifes and criminals. Most Iraq vets have drug habits or severe mental problems by the time they get back, and the ones who don’t have lost faith in everything that led them to join the Army in the first place.

All pretty standard stuff from post-Vietnam Hollywood, but writer/director Paul Haggis, who in 2004’s “Crash” also displayed the subtlety of a sharp stick in the eye, ups the ante. It turns out Mike was actually killed when, in the midst of some drunken horseplay on the way home from the bars, one of his buddies snaps and stabs him 42 times.

The killer apologizes to Jones’ character, saying Mike could have just as easily done the same thing. And, by the way, Mike also liked to torture wounded Iraqis on the battlefield just for kicks.

Of course, all these filmmakers, producers and actors have the undisputed right to say whatever they want. Even, and especially, in a time of war.

Like life, war often seems pointless and cruel, and art can often help to make some sense of things. But artists who don’t bother to explore or understand viewpoints other than their own seldom get through to anyone but those who already agree with them.

Much of the online chatter from critics and fans about these and other recent partisan films, like those by Michael Moore, illustrate this. Fans are quick to assert that only Republicans or Bush supporters could not like these films.

It’s as if going to an anti-Bush or anti-Iraq War film is another totem that today’s liberal must have, like driving a Toyota Prius or taking home delivery of The New York Times.

But portraying American troops as little more than stupid, cruel kids with no self-control or moral judgment simply ignores the quality and character of all but a few who volunteer. Part of supporting the troops includes honoring their choices to serve and recognizing that they might indeed want to accomplish their mission as much as they want to survive it.

It’s no surprise that American audiences have chosen not to pay $10 a seat for these lectures.

Aaron Keith Harris writes about politics, the media, pop culture and music and is a regular contributor to National Review Online and Bluegrass

Unlimited. He can be reached at aaronkeithharris@gmail.com