Okay, at the risk of incriminating myself, I went out to the movies last night... (Instead of working on my homework? Gasp!)
;-)
It was all in the name of *research*! Yeah, that's it!
It was all in the name of *research*! Yeah, that's it!
;-)
Anyway, I saw "Iron Man."
A portion of the movie takes place in Afghanistan. I made it a point to pay attention to the images they presented of the Arab characters as this is something we have been examining in my comparative literature course this semester. This, of course, distracted me from the purely visceral pleasure of watching a comic book hero movie; I hope you appreciate my sacrifice. ;-)
So, with my graduate hat on ...
I noticed that the filmmakers attempted to be even-handed about it. The bad guys are not introduced as Afghanis but under the title of their resistance movement (The Nine Rings, or something of that nature). However, the first and most prominent image we see--and in larger numbers--is the stereotypical terrorist figures: Arab men with weapons fighting from desert caves and willing to do anything they must, including torture, to get what they want. We are presented with some images of the "innocent" Afghanis--the helpless refugees torn from their homes--but this is done by the bad guys, their own people. And it takes an "American" hero to come in and save them. If they had left it at these polar opposites, I would be more critical; however, they also included an "intellectual Arab", a doctor, an educated man, who helps our hero and even lays down his life for the cause. But even this could fall under some criticism, because, after helping our hero, there seems to be nothing left for him to do but die.
Robert Downey, Jr.'s character does have an interesting arc-- he starts out as a heartless weapons dealer but then has a sudden change of heart when he discovers that his own weapons are being sold to the "enemy." But his moments of reflection are neither loud enough nor pointed enough. And the ultimate "enemy" (caution: spoiler alert) turns out to be an American, but an American *businessman* NOT the government. I must applaud the filmmakers for attempting something of a mildly subversive theme, but ultimately this is an action movie and not too many people are going to be thinking that deeply about it.
What I found most disturbing is how the audience (mostly young people) laughed every time the Arab bad guys were killed.
For the comic book genre of films, this is one of the better ones, and you can just sit back and enjoy it. We do like our heroes: The American maverick with ingenuity out to save the world from evil and injustice. But I got to thinking... Wouldn't it be a refreshing change to see an Arab maverick with ingenuity save the world? That would be a different movie indeed.
Anyway, I saw "Iron Man."
A portion of the movie takes place in Afghanistan. I made it a point to pay attention to the images they presented of the Arab characters as this is something we have been examining in my comparative literature course this semester. This, of course, distracted me from the purely visceral pleasure of watching a comic book hero movie; I hope you appreciate my sacrifice. ;-)
So, with my graduate hat on ...
I noticed that the filmmakers attempted to be even-handed about it. The bad guys are not introduced as Afghanis but under the title of their resistance movement (The Nine Rings, or something of that nature). However, the first and most prominent image we see--and in larger numbers--is the stereotypical terrorist figures: Arab men with weapons fighting from desert caves and willing to do anything they must, including torture, to get what they want. We are presented with some images of the "innocent" Afghanis--the helpless refugees torn from their homes--but this is done by the bad guys, their own people. And it takes an "American" hero to come in and save them. If they had left it at these polar opposites, I would be more critical; however, they also included an "intellectual Arab", a doctor, an educated man, who helps our hero and even lays down his life for the cause. But even this could fall under some criticism, because, after helping our hero, there seems to be nothing left for him to do but die.
Robert Downey, Jr.'s character does have an interesting arc-- he starts out as a heartless weapons dealer but then has a sudden change of heart when he discovers that his own weapons are being sold to the "enemy." But his moments of reflection are neither loud enough nor pointed enough. And the ultimate "enemy" (caution: spoiler alert) turns out to be an American, but an American *businessman* NOT the government. I must applaud the filmmakers for attempting something of a mildly subversive theme, but ultimately this is an action movie and not too many people are going to be thinking that deeply about it.
What I found most disturbing is how the audience (mostly young people) laughed every time the Arab bad guys were killed.
For the comic book genre of films, this is one of the better ones, and you can just sit back and enjoy it. We do like our heroes: The American maverick with ingenuity out to save the world from evil and injustice. But I got to thinking... Wouldn't it be a refreshing change to see an Arab maverick with ingenuity save the world? That would be a different movie indeed.
3 comments:
Thank you for your thoughts. I really appreciated them. If interested, I just posted a review of Iron Man on Amazon, responding to many of the same issues, though with a slightly different take. We'll see how long Amazon leaves the review up ;-)
Thank you for your comment! I read your review and left a comment on amazon.
Cheers,
~T
Based on yet another Marvel series, Iron Man has plenty of things going for it, the main assets being an enjoyable..
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