Fighting the Good Fight

Rating: Null/10 (11 December 2001)

Spoilers herein.
For decades, filmmakers have fallen into three camps:
--those that believe film is a simple entertainment medium focused primarily on storytelling
--those who function as artists in what they consider the newest and possibly most powerful art
--those that recognize the other two, but see film as as a means for conveying a message, beit journalism, essay or propaganda
Kirk Douglas was clearly in the third camp. A solid American, this is his personal commitment to liberal American values, seasoned by his zionism. The context was a dangerously paranoid government apparatus that was slipping very close to fascism.
Douglas was a major player at the time, and he is behind what we see here: good and evil; slavery and freedom; the power of a righteous stand. Not only is it explicit in the story, and his performance, but in the way the film was made and the collaborators selected. What makes this a mess is that there is a fundamental mismatch with watching through Kubrick's eye. He was brought in after production started and disowned the film on completion. He is clearly in the `art' camp, possibly America's best example. Incidentally, in recent years Douglas has shifted his membership retroactively to the `mere storyteller' role in a speech to the National Press Club and his book.
Sort of takes the honor out the principled stand, doesn't it?