Politically Correct...

Rating: 6/10 (16 August 2006)

I have to disagree with most of the critics. This film is not a masterpiece, but nothing more than a propaganda manifesto of political correctness, currently very much "in vogue" in 'developped western societies'. I rarely mix politics and films, but considering the aim and message of this movie, I cannot help myself from doing so in this case. I will therefore refrain from commenting on the technical and artistic aspects of the film and concentrate on the essence, which is highly politicized (to avoid any misunderstandings, I would like to clarify I am not Jewish, nor do I have any affiliation whatsoever with Jews or Israel).
This is a typical case of a film praised by all only because it has been made by a great director, and it carries a message almost everybody nowadays wants to hear: hear no evil, see no evil... It is far too simple to sit and preach peace on earth for all from a quiet place and at a safe distance, totally out of contact with reality, the harshness of the real world. Unfortunately, the reality is very much different from the one seen by looking out of a window of a multi-million dollar Villa in Hollywood. Life is a brutal game of survival; always has been, always will be. No matter how much we would like to think that the world is now a better place, that humans have evolved to being a non-aggressive, peace-loving species, the truth is nothing has ever changed since the dawn of time. We are still the same power-thirsty animals, fighting for dominance and survival. Only the means and the form of that fight have changed. We are fooling ourselves if we think that after the end of the cold war, now the world will quietly settle down and cuddle into an eternal period of universal peace. How blindsided can one get? There are wars everywhere, massacres perpetrated daily...
Notwithstanding the end of the cold war, the Russians still like to think of themselves as a superpower, they still see themselves as the 'anti-western' power, they still fear us and hate us, nothing has changed. The Chinese, very much the same. Do we honestly think they are our friends? Or do we prefer to do so because it is good business? The 'Islamic nation' on the other hand, is a story to itself. Do we really think we can simply sit together with the fundamentalists and talk it over? 'Talk it over' with people whose major ambition is to blow themselves up in order to try to kill one of us? Do we really think that they will be content with any kind of agreement? It hurts to think that so many people can be so foolish to believe such nonsense nowadays. Have we already forgotten the scenes of jubilation on the 'arab street' after 9/11? Mark my words: they will not stop before either they destroy us, or we destroy them..., whether we like it or not!
Freedom and peace are not a given, they have always come at a price. If we want to continue being free and to live in peace, we will have to fight for it. Just wishing for it to happen is not good enough! That is an important lesson we must never forget and remember to teach our children. This is why I consider the message that the film bears not only to be bad, incorrect or unrealistic; I consider it dangerous.