Art, Power, and Politics: Political Storytelling in Paintings, Music, and Movies 1666940615, 9781666940619

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Art, Power, and Politics

Art, Power, and Politics Political Storytelling in Paintings, Music, and Movies Michael A. Genovese

LEXINGTON BOOKS

Lanham • Boulder • New York • London

Published by Lexington Books An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www​.rowman​.com 86-90 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NE Copyright © 2024 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Genovese, Michael A., author.  Title: Art, power, and politics : political storytelling in paintings, music, and movies / Michael A. Genovese. Description: Lanham : Lexington Books, 2023. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2023034465 (print) | LCCN 2023034466 (ebook) | ISBN 9781666940619 (cloth) | ISBN 9781666940626 (epub) | ISBN 9781666940633 (paperback) Subjects: LCSH: Mass media—Political aspects—United States. | Storytelling—Political aspects—United States. | Art—Political aspects—United States. | Rhetoric—Political aspects—United States. Classification: LCC P95.82.U6 G46 2023  (print) | LCC P95.82.U6  (ebook) | DDC 306.20973—dc23/eng/20230815 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023034465 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023034466 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

This book is dedicated to Gabriela, my beautiful wife and muse, who inexplicably continues to put up with me (yes, miracles do happen).

Contents

Acknowledgments ix Introduction

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Chapter One: Tell Me a Story: On the Importance of Storytelling Chapter Two: On Seeing Politics: Paintings Telling a Story Chapter Three: On Hearing Politics: Music Talks Politics Chapter Four: On Movies and Politics: Political Storytelling through Films





7 39 65 91

Conclusion

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References

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Index

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About the Author



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Acknowledgments

I wish to thank Noura Alavi, graduate assistant, editor, project manager, and all-around superstar and research assistant extraordinaire, and Tessa Muller and Levon Najarian, for their hard work, patience (with me), and expert assistance in putting this project together. Also, I wish to thank mentor, friend, and frequent coauthor Thomas E. Cronin, who over the years has been encouraging and supportive, and who inspired me to work on this topic. My deepest thanks to you all.

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Introduction

It would have been some time in the late 1950s. My father, who to a small boy seemed larger than life, stronger than Superman, and smarter than Einstein, would sit with my sisters and me and tell stories. Not just bedtime stories, but stories of Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Lewis and Clark (we were Americans), Garibaldi (we were of Italian descent), Jesus Christ (we were Catholics), Mickey Mantle and Joe DiMaggio (we lived in New Jersey and were die-hard Yankee fans), and a host of other heroes and colorful characters. We were enthralled. I can still see in my mind’s eye an image vividly conveyed by my father, of Yankee outfielder Joe DiMaggio gliding “like a gazelle,” he would say, for a fly ball in left center. Is it surprising that, nearly sixty-five years later, I can remember virtually all of these stories and that I can still “see” Joe D gliding for a fly ball? Those stories are still embedded in my head, they still matter, they are still alive for me. Actually, it is not surprising at all. The stories of and from our lives stay with us. Stories are often memorable because memory is enhanced when we “see” the world through stories. These stories entertain, educate, and socialize. Movies and television use stories to lure us in. We pay money to be entertained, and movies and television programs that do not entertain fade away or are cancelled. Stories educate because, for example, the parables told by Jesus Christ had a purpose: to create a memorable story that taught a moral lesson. And stories socialize because, as with the stories my father told me about the Founding Fathers, they draw one in, teach about our shared past, generate loyalty to a particular order, and give us a common bond of political brotherhood. This book focuses on political storytelling as advanced through the arts. In doing so, we will focus on three forms of art: painting, music, and movies. These different forms of artistic expression cross centuries of history, yet all speak to our common theme: political storytelling across the ages. We learn about politics from various sources. We watch TV news, read blogs or newspapers and magazines, and talk with friends, family, and neighbors. We absorb the messages from our early political socialization, hear patriotic songs, celebrate the Fourth of July, sing the national anthem before 1

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baseball games—the list could go on and on. Through the course of our lifetimes, we are bombarded with political messages at work and play. Most of the time, we are not conscious of the political messages we are receiving. But they enter our subconscious minds and can affect the way we think, believe, and act. A class trip to an art gallery or museum, a Friday night date movie, or a song on the radio can all be seen as part of the political socialization process, with person-forming impacts, as received messages. So, let us make more explicit the often-implicit messages we receive; let us do a deep dive into some of the myriad ways society—and art—change, influence, and shape us. But think, for a moment, of how our different stories are received at different times. In a reading culture, we were usually alone, our imaginations were sparked, and we—alone—processed the story. In a television or movie culture, we, a group, a community, a family, shared the viewing experience. Today, in a digital culture,1 we are largely alone with our screens, divorced from human contact. If stories fulfill an “ancient function of binding society by reinforcing a set of common values and strengthening the ties of common culture,”2 how does form impact function? How different is the message received when we share the experience versus when we experience a “bowling alone” moment?3 Still, alone or with a group, stories inform, educate, and define us. “Story— sacred and profane—is perhaps the main cohering force in human life. A society is composed of fractious people with different personalities, goals, and agendas. What connects us beyond our kinship ties? Story.”4 Stories give a kinship-type connection to disparate individuals and groups. They make us a community or even a nation.5 STORYTELLING IN A VISUAL AGE Today, political stories come to us in the form of television, movies, music, social media, and the news, as well as more conventional political sources. The gap between entertainment and news or politics has narrowed in this age of visual media. Political information, to be compatible with consumer trends, must be dressed in the cloak of entertainment. As Ronald Reagan said, “Politics is just like show business.”6 Our ancestors gathered around a campfire and told stories. This oral tradition developed community, entertained, and, at times, instructed. Such stories made “us”; they demonstrated both the deep need for community as well as the power of storytelling. The oral tradition would eventually give way to the written word, and storytelling took on a different form.

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The historical transition from print literary to visual literary brought with it a new way of seeing, learning, thinking, and knowing. In the age of print, reading was king. And reading is done under the control of the reader. That is, when I read a book or an opinion editorial, I can stop, reread, think about the idea(s) presented, evaluate these ideas in comparison to other information I’ve read, and think through the material I am consuming. But in a visual age, we become more dependent on what the creator of the message decides. When we watch the news or a political presentation on television, we simply “watch.” We are at the mercy of the pacing, content, and presentation style of the creator. We do not (although today we can) press the pause button or go back to see again what was said. We do not take command of the pace but are swept away by the pace determined by others. When you watch a political movie, you go with the flow, absorb, watch. You rarely interrupt the dramatic flow; you go along with it. After all, that is the whole purpose of entertainment (even infotainment). We might want to be informed, but we need to be entertained. Otherwise, we change the channel. Print literacy is well suited to thinking and learning. Visual literacy is not. Learning takes time and effort; we have to engage in the hard work of thinking. Print literacy asks much of us, but its rewards are many. Visual literacy, by contrast, asks only that we sit back, absorb, and enjoy. Thinking is an interruption. Neil Postman reminds us that today we live in “a culture in which all public discourse increasingly takes the form of entertainment,”7 and that “forms of discourse regulate and even dictate what kind of content can issue from such forms.”8 Thus, we are “amusing ourselves to death.” In this visual world, form does not follow function—it leads function. We watch. And in a visual world, watching replaces thinking and doing. Politics becomes a spectator sport, not a participatory activity. In this world, what have we gained, and what have we lost? “The medium,” Marshall McLuhan reminded us, “is the message.”9 The way we receive information shapes what we see. How we see impacts what we see. Postman writes that “what we watch is a medium which presents information in a form that renders it simplistic, non-substantiative, nonhistorical, and non-textual; that is to say, information packaged as entertainment.”10 Fox’s Tucker Carlson presents bold, blustering, exaggerated, wild conspiracy as “news” and is able to draw an audience that enjoys watching this “show.” Straight news? Boring. The truth? Bendable. We like to watch; we need to be entertained. We are daily bombarded with images, ads in magazines, billboards along the roadside, commercials on television, emails, text messages. We watch. But what else happens? If the medium shapes the message, what does it do to the

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consumer of these multiple images? Is Facebook addictive? Dangerous to the self-images of young women? A vital form of communication and sharing? Time. Two hundred years ago it took weeks for a message to travel from New York to London. Today, it takes nanoseconds. Miss your friend in Rome? Zoom or Skype. Want to be reminded of the name of the movie you watched last week? Google it. Have to have the latest book? Go to Amazon. The COVID-19 pandemic tested us in many ways. Lockdowns, school shutdowns, closed restaurants and clubs, work from home. To many, it was devastating. Some became alone and isolated. Others developed emotional problems. We were all under pressure. But for most of us, we found ways to manage, adjust, even thrive. Locked at home, the computer, the television set, the laptop became our link to the outside world, our link to humanity. Some of us learned to use technology to link up to friends, resume work, or order groceries. Many of us became slaves to social media. The story may be apocryphal, but it is said that Ernest Hemingway was having lunch at the Algonquin in New York with other authors. He made a bet with the table: “I can tell a complete story in just six words.” His friends took the bet. So, Hemingway wrote his story on a napkin and handed it around, and upon reading the story, each friend ponied up the bet. The story? “For sale, baby shoes, never worn.” I guarantee that story will stay with you forever. It is short, to the point, evocative. It sits in the mind, and we can see the agony of the parents. We see the dark room in which they sit; feel the weight of sorrow that surrounds them; share in their pain. Stories are like that. We are social and political animals. We need each other. This was nowhere more evident than in our multiple responses to COVID-19. And we remained connected via technology. When we had to occupy and entertain ourselves, technology replaced person-to-person contact. Movies, television programs, stories, seen on television sets connected us, reminded us of our common humanity, and presented stories to us. These stories mattered to us. But then, stories always have. So, let us take a deep dive into stories and storytelling to reveal how central they are to self-understanding, political socialization, entertainment, education, and life. To demonstrate how our need—our hunger—for stories has manifested itself over time, we will carve out three key areas for examination: paintings, music, and movies. Each exhibits a form of storytelling that has spoken to us and that matters to us. And each method of storytelling connects us to a common humanity and a common story of who we are.

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THE PUZZLE AND THE MESSAGE The puzzle we are trying to solve is why and how stories shape our views. We will use paintings, music, and films to illustrate several ways stories are presented and why they resonate, why they matter to us. We do this in part to inform but also to alert you to ways you are being influenced subconsciously. Stories may move, influence, and manipulate us. They hold a sort of magical power. We get drawn in; we identify with the protagonist, begin to adopt their views of good and bad, right and wrong. Storytellers have power. In the hands of a malign figure these stories may lead us astray. Audiences who saw Leni Riefenstahl’s staged documentary Triumph of the Will (1935), a masterwork of propaganda, could not help but be impressed with its power. Some were drawn in, while others were repulsed. Not all stories are embraced as truth. And yet, the images stay with us. If we are unaware of the power of stories, we are more easily manipulated. Thus, the message of this book is that while stories enthrall, entertain, move, and affect us, real thought, deep thought, requires us to engage in evidence-based rational thinking. It is hard work, where watching is easy work.11 When you see some of the paintings reproduced in this book, or remember the movies that touched you, you often engaged in “the willing suspension of disbelief.” This allows us to appreciate the art on its own terms. But in doing so, we cede part of sovereignty and independence to others. And so, the message is: be careful, do the hard work of deep thinking, know how to think for yourself, and take back control. NOTES 1. Nicholas Carr, The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains (Norton, 2020). 2. Jonathan Gottschall, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human (Mariner Books, 2012), 137. 3. Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (Simon + Schuster, 2020). 4. Gottschall, 138. 5. Claudia Mesch, Art and Politics: A Small History of Art and Social Change since 1945 (I.B. Tauris, 2014); and Joes Segal, Art and Politics: Between Purity and Propaganda (Amsterdam University Press, 2016). 6. Quote from: Elizabeth Drew, Portrait of an Election: The 1980 Presidential Campaign (Simon & Schuster, 1981), 9. 7. Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (Penguin Books, 1985), 3. 8. Postman, 6.

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9. Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore, The Medium Is the Message (Gingko Press, 2001). 10. Postman, 141. 11. Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (Penguin Books, 1985).

Chapter One

Tell Me a Story On the Importance of Storytelling

Stories matter. Stories help us digest information, make sense of our world, learn valuable lessons, understand ourselves, store information, find meaning, remember. Both personal and political stories matter. What is “my story”? What is “the narrative”? How does my narrative help me see and know where I came from, where I wish to go, who I am? And what is “your story,” and how does that help me to understand or empathize with you? Political stories tell us about who we are, where we came from, what unites us, what makes us a nation. It is about a shared past, a common inheritance, a joint history that makes us a tribe or a nation. In his 2021 presidential inaugural address, President Joe Biden tried to press the restart button after four tumultuous years of Donald Trump, which had culminated only two weeks before, in a January 6 insurrection that led to the storming of the US Capitol by Trump supporters. Biden did so, in part, by reimagining “our” story. In the speech, Biden mentioned “history” seven times and used the word “story” nine times. In attempting to set a new tone and chart a new direction, he asked Americans to join together to write a “story of hope, not fear; of unity, not division; of light, not darkness . . . of decency and dignity; of love and of healing; of greatness and of goodness. May this be the story that guides us. The story that inspires us. The story that tells ages yet to come that we answered the call of history.” DONALD TRUMP: MASTER STORYTELLER Donald Trump has dominated the public space. He sucked up all the oxygen in the room and left little space for anyone else. How did he come to so 7

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dominate our attention? The answer is simple: Donald Trump is a world-class storyteller. Trump spent roughly fifty years of his life as a (real estate) salesman. A good salesman is a good storyteller. And love him or hate him, there is no denying that he can almost always make himself the center of attention. Skilled in the art of self-promotion, Trump relishes the spotlight. So why does he get it while others don’t? Trump’s often repeated memes and catchphrases evoke visual as well as visceral images; “Drain the Swamp,” “Build a Wall,” or “Make America Great Again,” all paint pictures/stories in the minds of his audience. The simple declaration, “America was once great. America is no longer great. I will make America great again,” is the classic “hero’s journey” narrative of the hero facing a great challenge who saves us from monsters and dragons.1 It is a concise, short story about the past, the present, and the future. Trump told a story; Hillary Clinton had no story. ‌‌ During the 2016 presidential campaign, underdog Trump gained traction by telling a story. Trump’s story was dark, dystopian, and unsettling. He painted a grim portrait of an America mired in a morass of violence and depression. His vison was most starkly expressed in the story he told in his inaugural address in which he said in part: What truly matters is not which party controls our government, but whether our government is controlled by the people. January 20, 2017, will be remembered as the day the people became the rulers of this nation again. The forgotten men and women of our country will be forgotten no longer. Everyone is listening to you now. You came by the tens of millions to become part of a historic movement, the likes of which the world has never seen before. At the center of this movement is a crucial conviction, that a nation exists to serve its citizens. Americans want great schools for their children, safe neighborhoods for their families, and good jobs for themselves. These are just and reasonable demands of righteous people and a righteous public, but for too many of our citizens, a different reality exists. Mothers and children trapped in poverty in our inner cities, rusted out factories, scattered like tombstones across the landscape of our nation, an education system flush with cash, but which leaves our young and beautiful students deprived of all knowledge, and the crime, and the gangs, and the drugs that have stolen too many lives and robbed our country of so much unrealized potential. This American carnage stops right here and stops right now.

It became known as the carnage speech, and while dark and grim, it also contained a promise: only I can save you! The story was of a country ravished by violence, crime, drugs, and rusted-out factories. Ah, but there was hope, there

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was salvation, if only you followed Trump. A grim portrait but a journey of hope. In the end, Trump offered a better future, a brighter story. More was involved in Trump’s unlikely 2016 victory (not least of which was the baggage Hillary Clinton carried and the poor campaign she waged) than the story, but it was the story that gave Trump currency. And during his presidency, he continued to tell stories about criminal immigrants, dangerous Muslims, and voracious elites. These stories were often at odds with the truth.2 The truth mattered little—it was the compelling story, well told, that mattered. People hear the story; they are less interested in fact-checking. Does the story resonate? Does it tap our emotions? Is his narrative our narrative? Trump’s base felt put upon, ignored, and abused by “the swamp” and the elites. Trump made these “forgotten Americans” a central place in the story and a corrective (Trump) to their woes. They became the protagonists in their own salvation story, with Trump as the knight in shining armor. Narrative fidelity mattered little as the story resonated. Trump did not ask his audience to face reality; he changed their perception of reality to conform to his story. He tapped their emotions, not their intellects. He helped folks “feel” better. I will make you great again. And to Trump’s critics who cautioned that “America is already great,” they had no story, no vision of the future, no hope of a better tomorrow. Trump told people what they wanted to hear, not what they needed to hear. Did he pander to his base? Yes. But in a democracy, getting votes wins. And how best to win votes? A compelling story. Trump the master storyteller did not put his talents to rest after his 2020 defeat. He went back to his tried-and-true model and told a story of an America on the verge of collapse with the only salvation available is a return of Trump. Utilizing social media platforms, Trump told his followers that (*all capitalized text is Trump’s): “The United States is THIRD WORLD AND DYING,” he wrote, “THE AMERICAN DREAM IS DEAD.” He went on to describe a country controlled by “CRIMINALS AND LEFTIST THUGS,” in which immigrants are “FLOODING THROUGH OUR OPEN BOARDERS, MANY FROM PRISONS AND MENTAL INSTITUTIONS” and where the president is “SURROUNDED BY EVIL AND SINISTER PEOPLE.” He told supporters to “SAVE AMERICA” by protesting the pending arrest. A DYSTOPIAN WORLD WITH BUT ONE SAVIOR: TRUMP. A CLASSIC STORY. Our stories can define and redefine us, tell us who we are, and who we might yet become. Our stories matter.

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“The brain,” writes Jonathan Haidt, “is a story processor . . . Not a logic processor.”3 Our brains need stories. “There’s simply no way to understand the human world without stories.”4 It was important for Biden to reintroduce a narrative of hope so that the competing narrative—Donald Trump’s “carnage” story from his inaugural address—could be put in the nation’s rear-view mirror. In the battle for the soul of the nation, one essential truth emerges: he who captures the story, captures the country. Stories are one of the most elemental ways we process information. We understand the world through stories. Reading statistics may illuminate, but narratives stick. They pave the way for understanding. We “see” and even “feel” through stories. Stories are accessible to our brains; we can process narratives; they tend to have a beginning, a middle, and an end. They make sense to us. Most of the heavy lifting is already done for us. WE ARE OUR STORIES Stories are ubiquitous. In all societies, all religions, all cultures, stories exist. Origin stories, mysteries, war stories, conspiracies, biographies, science fiction, all proliferate societies. “We are, as a species, addicted to story. Even when the body goes to sleep, the mind stays up all night, telling itself stories.”5 We crave stories, need them, and so they saturate our lives. We are drawn to stories. “Human minds yield helplessly to the suction of story.”6 Americans spend about five hours per day watching television. Plus, we hear about five hours of music per day.7 All religions, across time and time zones and cultures, rely heavily on stories. All three of the great monotheistic religions—Christianity, Islam, and Judaism—tell their “truths” through stories. What is the Bible, if not an anthology of stories? From Sodom and Gomorrah to the Parables, from Abraham and the burning bush to Christ’s life, death, and resurrection: Christianity is the story of stories. And these stories are lodged in our minds. We remember them. Plus, they affect behavior. We often regulate around the rules derived from stories, from dietary restrictions to sexual behavior, from how we are to treat our neighbors, to how we wage wars. These stories matter. We are not putty in the hands of these stories. We can—and do—say no! But stories, across time, have regulated behavior. In this, they often serve an essential function. If the stories we agree to follow (religious rules, for example) spread through a society, they may be translated into law. And in this way, they may regulate our behavior, make it easier to live and work together, remove the grosser manifestations of irrationality from society.

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Figure 1.1.  Standing atop rubble with retired New York City firefighter Bob Beckwith, President George W. Bush rallies firefighters and rescue workers during an impromptu speech at the site of the collapsed World Trade Center in New York City. Source: Photo by Eric Draper, September 14, 2001, National Archives Catalog

In the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack against the United States, the film industry—like the public in general—went through a period of patriotic fervor. Movies such as The Sum of All Fears (2002), Behind Enemy Lines (2002), Tears of the Sun (2003), and The Interpreter (2005) reflected a surge of nationalism. Patriotism was popular, it sold, and Hollywood gave the audience what it wanted. Stories helped us process the meaning of 9/11 and come to grips without emotions and hopes in its aftermath. For many of us, character is politics.8 And the key attributes of the American ethos are embedded in individuals and individualism. Rick, of Casablanca, loses his way, but by the end, comes back to his true (American) nature. George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life is on the verge of suicide, but in the end, he realizes that his good character is rewarded. And Will Kane of High Noon is the messianic hero and savior who stands up against evil. Governments do not get the job done; mass movements seem to matter little; politics is not important. Individual heroes are the key. Statecraft is individual soul-craft.

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READ ME A STORY Once upon a time . . . We’ve all done it, a bedtime plea to a parent to “read me a story.” It is universal, ubiquitous, and important. “Stories,” the social, political, and cultural act of sharing some account (story) or narrative that conveys a message. We share stories to entertain, enlighten, and socialize. They can scare us, inspire us, and even put us to sleep. Often associated with mythmaking; storytelling—the oral tradition— predates writing. Designed to bring meaning and understanding to human existence, stories tell us about our past, our hopes and aspirations, fears and strengths, origin stories and socializing agents, enlightenment and education. Across time and cultures, stories and folktales, scary stories and fairytales cut across time and place to share common themes and structures. Our myths (origin stories), our aspirations (tales of honor and achievement), our legends (knight in shining armor saving the helpless princess), our fears (the big, bad wolf), and our coping mechanisms (and they all lived happily ever after) are embedded in our cultures and passed down from one generation to another.9 Making sense of the world is a hard-wired function of our brain. It helps us to survive if we can predict what a predator will do or if we can plan food supplies for winter (winter and the following spring are predictable). If the world makes sense, then we can have some control over it. Our desire for some control is very strong. A world that does not make sense (which might actually be the case) is a world in which we have no control. Stories allow us to imagine some sort of cohesive organization of the world, a world in which we can have some control. A narrative, with a beginning, middle, and end, is also analog for a sense of purpose in our life. As a narrative progresses, we sense that there is a goal ahead, and things change toward that goal. The direct analogy is that our life has a purpose, which is a very comforting notion. Nietzsche suggests the possibility of looking at an uncaring, unpredictable, purposeless universe. This is the “abyss.” To create art is to create our own version of our world. He is trying to describe the power of the classic Greek drama, but he may also be describing today’s myth-making industry. Most stories have a concrete definite ending. These are usually stories about “good” overcoming “evil”—a young rebel who defeats a corrupt government, the rogue federal agent who saves the president, the army general who inspires his troops, the unassuming citizen who goes to Washington, the superhero defeating some evil nemesis. A closed-off narrative with a clear ending offers a lot of satisfaction. Hooray, the good guys won (and I am part of the good guys). The celebration

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is all about the end win—and about the heroic actions of a single person. In this type of end-win story, someone else does the hard work (the struggle, the battle) for us. We simply sit back and enjoy. Some stories, however, do not have a definite ending. Instead, they leave you with unanswered questions and the lingering sense that work still needs to be done. Two examples: the movie, The Manchurian Candidate leaves the viewer with the question of just who is The Manchurian Candidate—how can one distinguish paranoia from reality? Dave ends with the good guy (Dave) going back to his small town and running for local office—the outcome uncertain. The implicit political message is that we (the audience) cannot just sit back and give over responsibility for a happy ending to someone else. We ourselves need to do the work. From the oral tradition of a storyteller weaving a mythic narrative around the campfire, to a moviemaker putting our dreams in celluloid, we cannot—it seems—live without stories.10 THE PATH OF THE STORY Before films and television, there were other avenues for storytelling apropos to their times. The oral tradition, with a group sitting around the open fire and a storyteller regaling his audience with stories passed down from generation to generation, served several purposes: entertainment, information, socialization. Later, paintings were used to tell stories to an audience of either the elite or the largely uneducated public. Artists got their audiences to “see” the story in one-dimensional form. Two of the seminal works of the western canon, The Iliad and The Odyssey, came from the oral tradition of storytelling. The Greek poet Homer (some scholars doubt he ever existed), a blind poet, was said to travel from Greek city to city, telling tales of great heroes, gods, and their adventures. Poets such as Homer would customarily sing or recite stories, often while playing a lyre (small harp). If his stories entertained, people would donate money or food as thanks for his performance. Additionally, music has long been used to entertain and bring people together as well as to inform, inflame, and persuade. When moving pictures, then “talkies,” were invented, a new means of storytelling emerged. Television, and then cable and satellite, spread the means of entertainment and socialization into our living rooms and brought to the masses instant access to storytelling. From Homer to Mark Twain, to Toni Morrison, to James Cameron, storytellers fill an important function, not just for entertainment, but to inspire,

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educate, comfort, and enlighten. “The play’s the thing,” Shakespeare’s Hamlet reminded us. The play, the story, is “the thing” that binds us together in our common humanity. “If you prick us, do we not bleed?” Shakespeare’s Jewish character in The Merchant of Venice asked, highlighting our common humanity, our shared commonality. Our stories are our shared stories.11 Homer’s tales of the Trojan War were taken up by other storytellers and eventually written down. They became a cultural component of Western thought and literature. These tales taught the Greeks of their past glories, passed down moral lessons from one generation to another, and gave a people scattered and divided into city-states a unified, national discourse and identity. And, in the case of Homer, an income. Storytellers of old times are linked to today’s storytellers and filmmakers, both of whom have to attract an audience to survive and thrive. And to attract an audience, both have to be able to tell a good story. Storytelling engages us, draws us in. Both the intellect (our reasoning brains) and our hearts (our emotional brains) are activated. Reciting facts about poverty may inform; telling a story about a poor family struggling to make ends meet helps us feel. Stories are maps or guides to the inner psyche which allow us to learn about ourselves and our connection to the world around us. We are a part of these stories as they are a part of us. They have helped shape us as individuals, but also connect us to the larger community and to others. Stories bond as well as bind.12 Movies are an excellent vehicle for storytelling. And who tells a better story today than Pixar? Founded in 1979, Pixar was originally a part of LucasFilm, but split off from its parent organization in 1986. The Walt Disney Company bought Pixar in 2006. Best known for its Toy Story franchise, Coco (2015), Up (2009), Luca (2021), and a host of other animated favorites, Pixar really knows how to tell a compelling story.13 Pixar looks at the human condition, our common concerns, and lures the viewer into communion with the protagonist and the struggle our hero faces. We are presented with a character with whom we can identify and for whom we can root. Usually an underdog, we travel with this character as they overcome challenges. Their battles are our battles. We share their dilemma, understand their struggle, are moved by their grit and determination, and we see ourselves in their faces. By immersing ourselves in a story, we may become enchanted and experience vicariously the circumstances, decisions, and lives of others. We share the protagonists’ challenges, struggles, and joys. We root for the protagonist and want them to succeed. Stories thus transport us into the lives and worlds of others. I can read Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover and “know” what Constance is going through; we can “learn” from Flaubert’s Madam Bovary

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that the single-minded quest for pleasure cannot possibly lead to happiness or fulfillment; we are drawn into Dalton Trumbo’s protagonist Johnny in Johnny Got His Gun and “feel” the hopelessness and absurdity of war. Stories play a constitutive role, establishing the legitimacy of something. Thus, stories (narratives) shape reality for us. As scholar Peter Brooks wrote forty years ago: Our lives are ceaselessly intertwined with narrative, with the stories that we tell and hear told, those we dream or imagine or would like to tell, all of which are reworked in that story of our own lives that we narrate to ourselves in an episodic, sometimes semiconscious, but visually uninterrupted monologue. We live immersed in narrative, recounting and reassessing the meaning of our past actions, anticipating the outcome of our future projects, situating ourselves at the intersection of the several stories not yet completed.14

This view was echoed recently in the final episode of the popular cable television series, Game of Thrones, when Tyrion, on claiming the throne, claims, “There’s nothing in the world more powerful than a good story. Nothing can stop it. No enemy can defeat it.” The story supersedes facts or logic, thus creating the opportunity for the “tyranny of storytelling.” We are, as psychologist Jerome Bruner notes, living by “the narrative construction of reality.”15 T. S. Eliot, in his poem “The Hollow Man,” wrote that “Between the idea/ And the reality/ Falls the Shadow.” And what shapes our understanding of the “shadow”; what falls in the shape and form? The narrative. The story puts the meat and bones onto the shadow. Social scientific research has established that we act on the basis of perceptions, not necessarily facts. Facts (evidence) can be useful, instructive, even determinative, but in the battle of fact versus perception, perception wins just about every time.16 For example, as the 1992 presidential election approached, the US economy was measurably gaining momentum. President George H. W. Bush inherited a mess from his predecessor Ronald Reagan, and it was Bush’s unenviable task of cleaning out the Aegean stables left behind by Reagan. He did so, to generally positive effect. Did Bush gain electoral credit for doing a good job? No. Public perception lagged behind economic facts, and people believed that the economy was getting worse, even as the facts clearly demonstrated that this belief was wrong. Bush lost. How many people opposed Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 on the mistaken belief that he was born in Africa? As absurd and demonstrably false as that perception was (or that Obama was a Muslim), a number of Americans believed it to be true and acted (voted) on this belief.

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How? Why? A very good salesman told a compelling story. The story was false, but it was told with skill and conviction, and it was told often. Donald Trump sold a lie to his constituency, and they followed their Pied Piper to the polling place and voted against Obama. Do facts matter? Sometimes. Is evidence important? Sometimes. If facts and evidence are only marginally important, what does matter? A good story, well told. What happens in our brains when we hear a compelling story? What draws our attention and what matters to us? Clearly on one level, stories can capture our attention, but on a deeper level they can pave the way for persuasion, open us up to ideas, help us process information, and “reduce defensiveness, teach complicated concepts, change individuals’ behaviors, and promote social change.”17 Stories, as scholar Emily Falk notes, “are processed differently from other types of information in the brain.” Why so? Because processing information contained in stories often bypasses the usual neural roadblocks and allows us to see and feel in a more direct way. As Falk notes, “Stories are one tool to help people simulate and understand social experiences they’ve never personally gone through.”18 It is easier for us to identify with, understand, and empathize via stories than statistics. The rational and emotional parts of our brains are important to decision making. Stories can have a significant impact on how we “see” the world. Storytelling engages our heads and our hearts, our intellect and our emotions. Stories paint pictures in our brains, pictures to which we can relate. We do not simply process words or statistics; we can experience worlds inhabited by others. Their lives vividly merge with ours. As historian Rick Shenkman notes, “We actually have a chemical reaction in our brains to stories,” and that our brain “privileges stories.” The reason should be fairly clear: “the more complicated the world seems, the more desperate we become for stories to help us make sense of things.”19 We need stories. The scholar Joseph Campbell helps us understand the role and impact of storytelling with his focus on the hero’s journey: our hero faces a crisis and must meet the challenge by overcoming obstacles—as when David slew Goliath—and emerging from the fire of crisis to victory.20 The hero—someone who devotes him- or herself to something bigger than oneself—goes through trial by fire and emerges victories. This hero myth, this arduous journey, can be found in virtually any society at any time or place in human history. We seem to need such stories. Storytelling takes the personal and makes it political by universalizing the experience. What once was private—a personal challenge, a hero’s journey— is made applicable and universal by telling the story, giving us some “skin in the game,” making it our story. It moves from my story to our story and now,

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we are in it together. An injustice done to the protagonist is—in a way—done to us. It opens up the possibility of concerted action. Leaders can sometimes command us to follow, but more often, they must persuade us. One of the best ways to do so is to tell stories. In the New Testament, Jesus uses parables—stories—to get his audience to see and feel—and then, follow. These compelling stories resonated; they were accessible.21 John Quincy Adams is alleged to have said that “whoever tells the best story wins.” Overstated, no doubt, but it is a point well made. We “know” the world through stories. We meet new people, go to new places, go back or forward in time, face monsters, climb mountains, love and laugh through stories. How does movie storytelling tell us about American politics? What can we learn about ourselves by examining popular culture and movies? Plenty. But there is also a dark side to this storytelling. If stories can elevate and enlighten, they can also debase and mislead. An adept artist such as German filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl can employ her ample talents into the service of a monster like Hitler, as she did in the quasi-documentary Triumph of the Will (1935), a celebration of Hitler and a call to mass followship. As George Bernard Shaw noted in his play Major Barbara, “You cannot have power for good without having power for evil too. Even mother’s milk nourishes murderers as well as heroes.” “We are, as a species, addicted to story. Even when the body goes to sleep, the mind stays up all night, telling itself stories.”22 Stories allow us to engage with humanity, with the experiences we share, the challenges we all face—together. We easily identify with the hero or protagonist of a story. Stories please us and connect us. As Jonathan Gottschall writes, “If story were just pleasurable frippery, their evolution would have long ago eliminated it as a waste of energy. The fact that story is a human universal is strong evidence of biological purpose.”23 If one were to be asked, “What was the first story?” the answer would likely be “the story of Adam and Eve.”24 And the Bible is full of memorable stories, including the parables of Christ—stories designed to make a point and teach a lesson. In fact, the holy books of three great monotheistic religions—Christianity, Judaism, and Islam—are collections of stories. And these stories are set in our brains. HOW? How does this process work? Neuroscience helps us understand both how the brain works and why stories matter to us. Something happens in our brains

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on stories. On functional MRI scans, several areas of the brain light up when someone is listening to a compelling story. In fact, when listening to a really good story, neural activity in our brain increases fivefold. Stories wake up our brains. We often relate to the key characters in a story, see ourselves in their situation and identify and empathize.25 In such cases, our brains release dopamine (which makes us feel good). Our brains respond to information by looking for the story to help make sense out of experience. Stories are a primal form of communication, they are timeless and connect us to ancient traditions, myths, and symbols. In this way, they help connect us to “universal truths.” They connect us to each other and to groups and help us understand ourselves better. Stories provide scripts and schemas, mental maps that help us understand the world around us and our place in that world. When we hear an interesting story, a certain part of the brain—Wernicke’s area—is activated. This helps us translate words into meaning. We all carry around stories in our heads. Does this mean we are all delusional, controlled, and manipulated by the story? Stories are not the only way we receive and process information. Facts, statistics, graphs, charts, and so on also convey information, but stories are more important than most means of receiving information because of how we process stories for meaning. Facts are good, but stories provide meaning. The rational pursuit of knowledge is the Enlightenment goal to which we can all aspire. Facts matter. The evidence should always guide us. But just how rational are we? All of us fall into the decision traps such as anchoring, confirmation bias, and the sunk cost effect. We thus possess not pure rationality but bounded rationality. We are not Homo economicus (purely rational decision makers). Our rationality is limited, and our emotions matter greatly. Making good decisions means integrating our rational with our emotional sides (the head and the heart, some would say). Thus, facts matter, but stories stick. Stories can appeal to the rational and the emotional elements of our brains.26 We are capable of rationality yet often decide based on emotions.27 As Annette Simmons writes, “Our choices are primarily driven by our feelings.”28 But why are we so attracted to stories? The great American writer John Steinbeck said that: We are lonesome animals. We spend all of our life trying to be less lonesome. One of our ancient methods is to tell a story begging the listener to say—and to feel—“Yes, that is the way it is, or at least that is the way I feel it. You’re not as alone as you thought.”29

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Reason and emotion. Good decisions tend to reflect the needs of both. As Jonah Lehrer writes, “If it weren’t for our emotions, reason wouldn’t exist at all.”30 Stories help the brain integrate reason to emotions, giving us the two key elements of decision making. The brain, in its ongoing effort not to expend energy (our brains are actually pretty lazy), seeks out a quick, plausible answer. Our brains are constantly going through an effort to avoid the hard work of thinking. Thinking things through takes time and effort. So, the brain finds shortcuts on the road to decision making. The search for such shortcuts is called heuristics. Lisa Cron describes how stories connect to our brains, writing that “our neural circuitry is designed to crave story—it makes us willing pupils, primed to absorb the myriad lessons each story impacts.”31 She adds, “a powerful story can have a hand in rewiring the reader’s brain.”32 We thus hunger for stories; and our brains are hungry receptors for stories. Cron notes: We think in story. It’s hardwired in our brain. It’s how we make strategic sense of the otherwise overwhelming world around us. Simply put, the brain constantly seeks meaning from all the input thrown at it, yanks out what’s important for our survival on a need-to-know basis, and tells us a story about it, based on what it knows of our past experience with it, how we feel about it, and how it might affect us. Rather than recording everything on a first come, first served basis, our brain casts us as “the protagonist” and then edits our experience with cinema-like precision, creating logical interrelations, mapping connections between memories, ideas, and events for future reference.33

Cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker sees stories as tools for education and adaptation. They simply make life easier and better. Fictional narratives supply us with a mental catalogue of the fatal conundrums we might face someday and the outcomes of strategies we could deploy in them. What are the options if I were to suspect that my uncle killed my father, took his position, and married my mother? If my hapless older brother got no respect in the family, are there circumstances that might lead him to betray me? What’s the worst that could happen if I were seduced by a client while my wife and daughter were away for the weekend? What’s the worst that could happen if I had an affair to spice up my boring life as the wife of a country doctor? How can I avoid a suicidal confrontation with raiders who want my land today without looking like a coward and thereby ceding it to them tomorrow? The answers are to be found in any bookstore or any video store. The cliché that life imitates art is true because the function of some kinds of art is for life to imitate it.34

Michel de Montaigne once wittily noted that, “My life has been full of terrible misfortunes, most of which never happened.”35 And that is part of the beauty

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of stories, they allow us to “experience” life’s vicissitudes in the safety of our homes. We travel into the jungle with explorers, march with Martin Luther King, Jr., are trapped in a civil war or leading a charge against the enemy. Increasingly, with the rise of social media we see the opportunity for the democratization of storytelling. The potential reach is astonishing. One can create stories, readers can respond, and participation can be further extended via other platforms such as Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook, and YouTube. But is more necessarily better? The storytelling industry—books, movies, music, television, and other platforms—is large, diverse, powerful, and influential. It generates billions in revenue dollars. And it is dominated by white males. The democratization of storytelling holds the potential to truly diversify the voices available, but will the proliferation of voices be drowned out by volume and the lockout of the voices from large, powerful outlets? STORYTELLING IN POLITICS Stories play a central part in a variety of academic disciplines. In anthropology, stories bind cultures, integrate knowledge and belief systems, and explain how a group’s history is passed down from generation to generation. Knowledge integrates group identity through stories.36 If culture is “learned,” it is stories that do the teaching. In this, anthropology is a sort of theoretical storytelling where “thick description” tells a deep narrative about the “truths,” accepted and handed down. We use stories because they tell us what matters in a culture.37 In sociology, concepts such as social class, gender differences, socialization, and alienation, to name a few, rely on storytelling to help us understand key concepts within the discipline. The story of the development of racial identity often resonates with both members of various minority groups as well as scholars and students of the subject. Stories bring these concepts to life.38 What, for example, can Downton Abbey tell us about social class? Or Titanic, Pride and Prejudice, and Gangs of New York? And how can movies such as The Graduate, Taxi Driver, Fight Club, or American Beauty help us understand alienation? These stories teach. In this field of psychology, the development of narrative psychology has developed utility in stories to help us understand how we deal with human experience by dissecting stories. Theodore R. Sarbin claims that human conduct can be understood best through stories.39 These stories connect us to society and social norms. They situate us into a broader society. Movies such as One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, A Beautiful Mind, Black Swan, and

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American Sniper gave us a glimpse inside the ongoing struggle of our place in society. The stories in our heads shape our behavior. Often, we think in analogies or metaphors. When confronted with a difficult foreign policy decision, presidents often struggle for an answer. Our brains seek out a pattern, a queue, something that helps us understand and decide. A threatening rival nation begins to assert itself? What do we do? Our brains begin to search for stories or analogies from the past that can help guide us when confronted with problems. North Korea is threatening South Korea? Iran is threatening its neighbors? China is stealing our intellectual property? How should we respond? Usually, we respond by finding an analogous situation and let that influence our policy choice. Do I see Conflict X as reminiscent of Pearl Harbor? Is the Munich analogy appropriate? What about the victim syndrome? Do these stories call on us to respond to threats militarily? Or through diplomacy? The Munich analogy (France and England appeased Hitler, and he took advantage of our weakness; therefore, we must respond boldly, even militarily, to threats) leads decision makers in one direction, but is it the right direction? In contemplating the possibility of a surprise cyber-attack against the United States, then Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta warned Congress, “I’ve often said that there’s a strong likelihood that the next Pearl Harbor that we confront could . . . be a cyber-attack that cripples our power systems.”40 Panetta framed the issue based on a mental model from the past: the Pearl Harbor analogy. Might he have chosen a different, more appropriate mental model? Latching onto one model early usually means we stop searching, decide prematurely, accept a narrative that is not well thought out. And this model can be used to shape policy. The story of Pearl Harbor became the story. The story, not necessarily the evidence, is what mattered. It is easier to simply apply a prefab analogy than to engage in the time-consuming, hard work of thinking. Our brains do not like expending energy, so they search for shortcuts. One common shortcut is to substitute analogy for thought. What to do about Iran? North Korea? China? Russia? Do we stand up to Kim Jong Un or bargain with him? Do we draw a line in the sand and warn Putin that to cross it means war? A trade war with China, or should we try to form a coalition with allies to coax China into changing their policy? How do we sort these complex questions out? We use the stories stored up in our heads. An analogy is a story in our head. This story serves as a shortcut in decision making. Rather than engage in the hard work of thinking, sorting through complex and at times contradictory evidence, trying to sort the wheat from

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the chaff, our brains search for presorted stories, patterns, or intellectual “Cliff notes” to make decision making less onerous. An analogy is something that suggests that two things are alike. If X looks like Y, and if Y is already a story in my head, why not merely conflate the two? Problem solved. Or is it? Often using analogies can rush us to judgment, allow us not to think a problem through, and in seeing similarities, we are often blind to differences. Analogous thinking is natural but dangerous. Analogies are related to metaphors. A metaphor is another brain shortcut that replaces a figure of speech and applies it to an object that may not be applicable. The Pearl Harbor Metaphor takes the December 7, 1941, surprise attack by the Japanese against the United States in Pearl Harbor41 as a lesson in preparedness and response initiation. We were viciously attacked, we must respond. December 7, as President Roosevelt told Congress and the nation, was “a day that will go down in infamy.” We took Pearl Harbor to mean a) be prepared and b) respond quickly and militarily to threats. “Remember the Alamo,” or “remember the Maine,” or “remember Pearl Harbor” serve as powerful symbols, instructive metaphors, and practical guidance to decision making. And the metaphors are sometimes entirely appropriate. Sometimes. Some of the key US foreign policy analogies are the Munich analogy, based on the outcome of the 1938 Munich Conference, where France and England followed a policy of appeasement toward Adolf Hitler. This emboldened Hitler. If we apply the Munich analogy, we are more likely to take a hard, confrontational approach to an adversary. But if we rush to judgment, we might not see the clues that indeed, our adversary may not be headed toward war. The Vietnam analogy is about accepting limits, not biting off more than you can chew, being careful about making military commitments. So far, so good. But are those imbued—even haunted—by the memory of, the analogy of Vietnam, too hesitant, too reluctant to get involved? As Robert D. Kaplan notes: Vietnam is about limits; Munich about overcoming them. Each analogy on its own can be dangerous. It is only when both are given equal measure that the right policy has the best chance to emerge. For wise policymakers, while aware of their nation’s limitations, know that the art of statesmanship is about working as close to the edge as possible, without stepping over the brink.42

Most leaders think—in part—in stories, or at least recognize how vital stories are to governing. Richard Nixon recalled a conversation with Nikita Khrushchev in which the Soviet premier told Nixon, “If the people believe

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there’s an imaginary river out there, you don’t tell them there’s no river there. You build an imaginary bridge over the imaginary river.”43 Effective political campaigns manage “the story” or the narrative, the campaign and the candidates are trying to sell. “Stay on message” is a constant instruction in a political world where the candidate so often must react to outside stories. Bill Clinton came from “a place called Hope” (Hope, Arkansas, that is). He built a campaign persona (story). Donald Trump’s campaign story was “outsider” and “successful businessman.” Obama was the man who overcame racism to rise to the top, helping voters feel good about voting for an African American for president. Not all presidential candidates tell a true story. George W. Bush was born to wealth, a student at the exclusive Phillips Academy, then Yale University, and received an MBA from Harvard University. Yet, he campaigned as a simple Texas country boy, one of “you.” He even changed his manner of speech, dropping the “g” at the end of most words to sound more like the voters to whom he pitched his campaign appeals. Bush’s tribal appeal44 was cultivated, deliberate, and designed to reinforce the story Bush was selling. It worked. Ronald Reagan was sometimes referred to as the “Great Communicator,” and indeed Reagan, trained as an actor, velvety voiced, soothing and comforting, had a way with words. But he was also a very good storyteller. His 1984 reelection campaign theme, “It’s Morning in America,” captured a theme, a mood, a feeling. It called forth pictures of a better tomorrow, of new hope and renewed opportunities. It was what we wanted and needed to believe. It was optimism made whole. This campaign narrative was the story of the election; it was a contributor to his landslide victory. Historian Rick Shenkman sums it up thusly: a key reason for Reagan’s success with voters was a function of “Reagan’s success in weaving together a powerful story that made Americans feel good about themselves. He was a great cheerleader. And what made him one was his ability as a storyteller.”45 And it isn’t just Reagan. Social scientist Howard Gardner wanted to find out if successful leaders had key traits in common. After interviewing a series of leaders, Gardner concluded that effective leaders share the ability to tell compelling stories. He noted that, “narratives that help individuals think about and feel who they are, where they come from, and where they are headed . . . constitute the single most powerful weapon in a leader’s literary arsenal.”46 He who captures the story captures the election. Overstated but largely true. Stories are an integral part of politics. The “fact” of inflation is important, but the “feeling” of where we are and where we are going is more important. Stories, and their attendant emotional impact, matter.

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MYTHS All countries have myths, all countries need myths, and all countries have founding myths. Why are myths so important and ubiquitous? What core function do they serve? A myth is a story, a story we tell ourselves and each other. We tell these stories because they fill a human need: to understand and explain some of life’s vexing and perplexing questions related to life in the polity. Who are we? Why are we here? Where do we come from? Myths are explanatory stories that indicate our place in the greater scheme of things. They make us a people, a nation. Common myths take on a particular quality when they emblemize a culture, linking the story of a culture to dominant myths. Thus, a particular “truth” is imposed that is compelling and, over time, taken for granted. It is true; it is us. It is, as John Hartley writes, “the social production and reproduction of sense, meaning, and consciousness.”47 And it is passed down from generation to generation, and the passing down takes place primarily through stories. Cultural theorist Clifford Geertz notes that culture is “an ensemble of stories we tell about ourselves,”48 and while we are not always conscious of these stories, they become a part of us. This helps establish a country’s ideology, set of beliefs, core assumptions and sets up “a fairly coherent and comprehensive set of ideas that explains and evaluates social conditions, helps people understand their place in society, and provides a program for social and political action.”49 Why, for example, do Americans accept a level of gun violence that other advanced nations find appalling? What is it about “us” that makes us so different? Our myths, our culture, and our unconscious ideologies impose a created truth that we accept and assume (or presume) that it is so because it is so . . . for us. As Cynthia Weber notes, “power works through myths by appearing to take the political out of the ideological.” She continues, “these sorts of natural facts are arguably the most intensely political stories of all, not just because of what they say (what the specific myth is) but because of what they do (they remove themselves and the tradition they support from political debate).”50 There is an amazing consistency across time and cultures where we see myths at work everywhere. They serve a deep human need. They scratch an itch. Myths explain, justify, validate, and legitimize our sense of self and our place in a larger community. They unite us as a people. They are the glue that binds us together. As John Kennedy said:

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The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived, and dishonest, but the myth—persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.51

A myth is a story we tell ourselves that helps explain who we are, our founding story, and, while often false or an exaggeration, captures key elements in our shared self-image and common story. We all need myths, in fact, “A world without myths is inconceivable.”52 Common American myths are the myths of the people, the American Dream, the Founding Father myth, the democracy myth, the log cabin myth. More than mere stories, myths serve a profound purpose: they define a political society. These sacred tales provide meaning in a confusing world, answer timeless questions, are a compass giving us a sense of place, purpose, and direction. They help us understand ourselves and our world. We are all susceptible to myths; we are all myth’s victims. They dominate, even control us. Myths serve an essential purpose. They bind us together, give us a shared history, a shared sense of the sacred, a story that links us together as Americans. “As a heterogenous society we have more of a need for myths than homogenous societies,”53 says Shenkman. The United States has no national religion, a very short history, no royalty to unify behind. So, what makes us a nation? Our shared myths. Among our sacred, shared myths are the George Washington myth, the myth of the framers, the equality myth, the one-nation myth, the land-of-the-free myth. These are stories we tell our children, generation after generation. Historian Rick Shenkman notes the especially important role myths play in the development of the national identity of the United States: “Myths were especially important to us because as a nation of immigrants we lacked a common ancestry and tribal ties. All that we really had in common were those myths.54” The founding myth is one of our most powerful and persistent myths. We are told from early childhood that at the founding of the United States, a band of great men, all of whom fought for and believed deeply in democracy, broke from their oppressive past to create a new democracy “for the people.” And while the myth may fit a few of the framers, for the most part, the framers were quite suspicious of democracy, harbored great doubts about the wisdom of the common man, and feared government in the hands of the masses. The evidence to support this revisionist view of the framers is overwhelming, and yet we persist in clinging to the story and misinforming our children for generation after generation. This founding myth is so important to us, so engrained in the national character, that we would rather perpetuate a lie than face the truth. The story matters.

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MARVELOUS STORIES IN COMICS Did I read Moby-Dick, or did I read the Classics Illustrated adaptation of the book? Ivanhoe? The Adventures of Robin Hood? The Man in the Iron Mask? The Three Musketeers? Yes, my first, and in a few cases, only, exposure to some to the great works of literature came as a young boy drawn to the bright colors, the limited text, and the bold adventures found in comic books. They were in a very real sense my first exposure to the great works of literature. The secret sauce that led to the popularity of comics was their ability to tell stories to a young, unsophisticated audience. The great literature was made accessible; the new superheroes were magnets; the stories were clear, simple, digestible. We were, we are, drawn to the storytelling. In the world of a prepubescent boy, comic books—along with baseball cards—were ubiquitous. And today, the universe of comic books has expanded to blockbuster movies, superhero T-shirts, children’s vitamin jars, Halloween costumes, video games, mugs and glasses, and just about anything on which a logo can be affixed. Yes, even Broadway musicals.55 Over the years, escapist juvenile fantasy became more socially conscious, more overtly political, more relevant. The colorful characters and superheroes that so mesmerized young boys (until recently, comics primarily appealed to young boys) captured our playground fantasy. We were Clark Kent, the bespectacled everyman, undistinguished and nearly invisible who really was, deep down inside, a superhero with superpowers. Oh, that would take care of the playground bully! A superman was in each and every one of us. Oops, gotta go. Here comes the neighborhood bully.56 BEYOND THE SUPERFICIAL APPEAL Do comics tend to speak to the better angels within us, or do they cultivate and reinforce some of our worst impulses? In some ways, modern comics reflect progressive values; in other ways they speak to authoritarian, racist, and reactionary sentiments. From the first Captain America comics, which had Captain America punching Adolf Hitler in the jaw, to Batman battling his disfigured enemies, politics were an integral part of the world of comics. Our superheroes had to do battle in a Manichaean world of evil forces intent on destroying our way of life. We were helpless; we had to be saved by these powerful figures.57 Democracy wasn’t enough; politics could not save us. Only a domineering, powerful leader could save us. While most of the early comics were directed at appealing to prepubescent male fantasies, the depictions of sex, death, and horror began to draw

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criticism.58 Such criticism led the industry to establish a self-regulating system, the Comics Code Authority. The 1950s were a time of conformity, and many of the comics, careful not to offend, lost their edge and descended into bland yet safe fare. Among the dissenters was MAD Magazine (to which I was addicted), which began publishing in 1952. MAD Magazine brought political and social satire and a bit of humor and healthy irreverence to America’s youth. In its peak years, 1973–1974, MAD Magazine had a circulation of over two million readers. As society changed, comics changed. After World War II, they began to reflect the changes going on in society. On women’s liberation (see: Linda Carter, Student Nurse, and Squirrel Girl), race (Black Panther), the dangers of Brexit (Captain Britain and the Mighty Defenders, #2), and on the changing nature of presidential leadership (Duck Avengers #1), comics sometimes took a progressive path59, and at other times explored dark areas.60 Yes, there is also a dark side to comics. They often promote vigilante justice, as is evident with The Punisher, who became a popular figure with law enforcement officers as well as January 6 insurrectionists.61 Women’s studies professor Menaka Philips compares superheroes from several Netflix shows, contrasting The Punisher with Jessica Jones (a feminist superhero) and Luke Cage (an African American superhero). The Punisher’s (Frank Castle) wife and children are killed, and Castle, a white male, uses extreme violence to eke out his revenge against a variety of criminals. Where Jones and Cage resist the use of violence, Castle embraces it.62 Political scientist Dennis Young, discusses Philips’s on the subject: Philips argues that the close affiliation between law enforcement and the symbol of the Punisher is indicative of the fact that these men feel threatened and perceive white masculinity to be under attack. She suggests that those who adopt his logo do so because it seems to represent this lost status and their resulting rage. The idea of unrestricted violence to police the line of good and evil may be particularly symbolic for people who have usually had access to this violence but, in the wake of movements for police accountability, are finding this access challenged for the first time. Philips concludes not by suggesting that we all become Punishers, but by suggesting that the Punisher and his appropriation provides important insight into the popular imagination, and that to move forward as a country we must seriously grapple with how the American public differentiates between legitimate and illegitimate uses of violence in ideas about the heroes depending on the identity of the perpetrator.63

It took a long time for comics to move out of their racist phase—Sheena, Queen of the Jungle, and Thun’da, King of the Congo—to offer a more positive image (Black Panther). Young Black audiences had few familiar

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role models and were forced to root for white heroes to satisfy comic book fantasies.64 While over the years, comics have presented a wide range of characteristics and social and political views, and while there is no one monolithic position they take, there is nonetheless a set of fairly persistent themes and messages we can discern. • • • • • • • • • •

Comics condone violence. Comics are antidemocratic. Comics reinforce the status quo. Comics are often racist. Comics portray the world in a simplistic, good guys vs. bad guys manner. Comics tell us that strongmen rule (and should). Comics tell us that the common man doesn’t amount to much. Comics condone vigilante violence. Comics remind us that men rule. Politics is about waiting for a strongman to save us.

Yes, comics tell us consistently that we don’t matter much. While not helpless, we are certainly weak and unable to protect ourselves or our loved ones. We need a superhero to save us. So, we wait, hoping that a Superman will come along, in politics and in real life. Waiting is not democracy. Working, participating, getting involved, organizing—that is democracy. But we are told that we can’t, we aren’t suited to lead or act in union with fellow citizens. We must rely on a hero to save us. Thus, in times of stress, we look for a knight in shining armor to come to our rescue. How undemocratic; how potentially dangerous. THE POWER OF BIBLE STORIES We are all—even non-Christians—familiar with many of the parables from the Christian Bible—why? Why do these stories stick with us; why are they memorable? Because they are lessons told to us as stories that resonate with us, that we can relate to, that are easy to remember. The story is both digestible and quite often unforgettable. Many of us grew up with these stories as the wallpaper of our early lives. They were there, all around us. And even today, we could retell these stories to our children from memory. “The Good Samaritan” (Luke; 10:25–37), the “Parable of the Sower,” (Matthew; 13:3–8), “New Wine in Old Wineskins” (Luke; 5:37–38), and “The Parable of the Good Shephard” (John; 10:1–5

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and 11–18) are examples of short stories designed to teach us lessons. “The Good Samaritan” is a classic example of a story delivered by Jesus which describes a traveler who is accosted by thieves, robbed, beaten, and left for dead. Several people pass by the traveler but ignore his plight. Then, a good Samaritan stops to help the traveler. The “love thy neighbor” message is easy to understand, easy to remember, and the phrase “good Samaritan” is now synonymous with a person who is caring and helps others. We confer such a sobriquet on someone we wish to compliment for their goodness and caring. Other nonbiblical parables and fables also make up the subconscious baggage we carry around with us. “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” (Aesop), “The Tortoise and The Hare” (Aesop), “Hansel and Gretel” (The Brothers Grimm), and “The Emperor’s New Clothes” (Hans Christian Anderson) are among the stories—often children’s stories—that signal clear moral messages and stick with us throughout our lives. No one is immune—stories stick with us. MONUMENTAL STORIES A particularly high form of praise is to be feted with a monument erected in one’s honor. While most visible in the capital cities of various nations, statues and monuments can be seen throughout most countries, and they are intended to give special praise to the heroes among us. Honoring heroes, remembering past glories and sacrifices, monuments tell us a story of who and what we feel deserve praise, admiration, and emulation. A stroll around Washington, DC, takes us to the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, the Jefferson Memorial, the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial, plus memorials from past wars, statues to military and political heroes, and tributes and celebrations of those who made America.65 A monument makes a statement and tells a story. Monument comes from the Latin/ French monere, which means “remind” and proclaims our values and aspirations by honoring those who we believe achieve the greatness that refer to who we are and how we wish to be known. Monuments are anything but neutral. In highlighting certain people or events, we choose to elevate, we make a clear statement, and hold them up as models to emulate. It should thus come as no surprise that in the Black Lives Matter era, monuments to southern Civil War figures have drawn attention and criticism. Who are these people we are honoring, and what message are we sending? What story do we wish to tell? Do these statues reflect respect for the past and historical heritage, or do they honor “traitors” (those who declared war against the federal government) and racists (those who fought for the preservation of slavery)? Totems to hatred and racism, or a way to venerate the

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sacrifices of ancestors? Are the protestors erasing history (cancel culture) or tearing down tributes to white supremacy?66 Public monuments serve a public or civic purpose. Their intent is to promote an idea or honor a person. We search for and need heroes, and monuments remind us of who we should admire and what we should aspire to. Monuments do not merely spring up organically. They are put up. The memorials to Southern Civil War figures are purposely erected to honor those figures and what they fought for. Few went through a public approval process. Private groups, like the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC), funded the erection of many statues, and their goal was to honor those who led the insurrection against the United States. The purposeful pursuit of propaganda via monument erection is by no means only a product of the past. The Ronald Reagan Legacy Project is a concerted effort to celebrate and iconize the former president. Founded in 1987 by conservative activist Grover G. Norquist, the project is “committed to preserving the legacy of one of America’s presidents throughout the nation and abroad.”67 They seek to erect monuments, name streets, landmarks, and roads after Ronald Reagan. The question is: if Reagan was so great and worthy, why does he need a group to press others to honor him? This effort to elevate Reagan above other presidents is not a spontaneous popular movement, but one directed by Reagan supporters and designed to tell a story and establish a tribute to Reagan. Monuments tell a story and he who controls the story shapes history. THE THREE “TIMES” OF ART Art should not be viewed in a vacuum. We see it within a certain context, time frame, cultural and political epoch. It is thus useful to view art within three different time dimensions: when the art was made, the time period the art depicts, and when we see the art. Be it a painting, a song, a photograph, or a movie, these three-time frames help us understand the intent of the artist, the key factors shaping each of the time frames, and the age in which we experience the art. The classic movie Casablanca is about World War II and has been seen by generations since. We see different things in Casablanca than our parents or grandparents. THEORETICAL UNDERPINNINGS How do paintings, music, and movies inform us about power and politics? There can, of course, be a direct connection as when movies like Wag the

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Dog, or songs such as “We Shall Overcome” explicitly deal with themes of power and politics. But even with less explicit political works of art, messages are still being delivered, ideas are still presented. Stories shape and define us. In linking art and politics, we can see how culture (even pop culture) and ideology are formed, transmitted, how they impact society. Art is one element in the building blocks of society. Paintings, music, and movies transmit ideas to a receptive public, and they are designed to reach an audience in ways that entertain. Such subtle reach means that ideas are transmitted by the artist(s) and received or absorbed by a willing audience. And these ideas matter are “hidden persuaders.”68 Art is thus—or can be—a part of the socialization process. They transmit ideas which are hidden persuaders, and inform audiences regarding society’s “givens,” or “self-evident truths.” As international relations scholar Cynthia Weber notes, “all cultural sites are powerful arenas in which political struggles take place,” and this helps us, “rethink the relationship between culture and politics. Culture is not opposed to politics. Culture is political and politics is cultural.”69 Art often reinforces, even helps establish, societal truths that are passed down from generation to generation. In doing so, it helps create identities and socializes viewers into subconsciously embracing numerous myths or accepted truths. The unstated becomes the accepted. Without thinking, without intentionality, we develop a set of core beliefs, cultural thoughts, and self-evident truths. High and low culture contribute to the propagating and circulation of meaning. I am of an age where James Bond (Sean Connery) taught me about society’s accepted vision of manhood, where patriotic music associated in my young mind, what America stood for, and presented to me—in palatable form—the myths that I unconsciously accepted. Many things made me “an American,” but a key contributor was culture. And it did so by dramatizing, sugar-coating, and entertaining me. Art thus dramatizes our accepted truths, holds them up for us to see, and tells us that this is truth. Of course, there is no simple monolithic version presented to us, but most art does reinforce the status quo and conveys to a wide audience, the myths on which culture and politics are built. Paintings (seen by relatively few), music (with different genres appealing to different audiences), and movies (often seen as a superficial form of pop entertainment) do not present truth, but they do present “truths.” They present stories, and these stories penetrate; we want to see and hear them; we invite them into our lives. Society’s myths find their way into popular culture.

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Myths are circulated via film, for example, as entertainment. Thus, we may be, in Neil Postman’s apt phrase, “amusing ourselves to death.”70 Art illustrates, critiques, and circulates the myths that guide us. And we usually accept these myths without doing the hard work of thinking. Do these hidden persuaders really persuade or merely entertain? Given that all this takes place via stories, we can see culture as “an ensemble of stories we tell about ourselves.”71 We can now see the theoretical underpinnings (or the theoretical “framings”) that inform this work. A theory is a proposition that makes a truth claim. It is a substantial explanation of how something works. It tells us what is what, and allows us to then make predictions that are testable. A good theory generates testable propositions (hypotheses). In everyday language, a theory is an educated hunch based on clear observations, or a coherent set of propositions that explains X. A theory explains something to us; it is a shorthand way of understanding and explaining, providing us with organizing generalizations and testable truth propositions and, where accepted, become so familiar that we begin to take them for granted as they impose a worldview of what appears to be true. We are familiar with Einstein’s theory, the big bang theory. In politics, we are familiar with Marxist theory, or elite theory, with the public choice theory, or the theory of iron triangles. They are sense-making propositions that try to provide a rationale, an explanation, a view of how things work. They make it easier to deal with the complexities and uncertainties of life. The link of theory to our story can be seen in the view that art is a hidden source of influence that justifies, helps create, and reinforces the dominant forces of the status quo. Yes, some art (protest songs, for example) take on the status quo, but for the most part art speaks for power. In this way, art—and the stories art tells—is often a tool of the dominant interests of society. It thus usually reinforces hierarchy, whiteness, maleness, and capitalism.72 Plus, art is deeply connected to myth73 and myth making. These myths— for example, the myth of the Founders as champions of democracy—may or may not be true, but we come to believe they are true; they take on an air of the sacred. And those beliefs shape our ideology or worldview as well as shaping behavior. Hollywood is often called our myth factory. Alternative visions are expressed, countercultural messages are delivered because culture is neither static nor monolithic. Movies like Dr. Strangelove (1964) mock the culture of Cold War confrontation, and songs of protest assault the status quo. Resistance is not futile. There is “a discourse of possibility” that challenges orthodoxy. But the status quo—while not innumerable—has a strong hold over our imagination.

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The stories—myths—are agents of social control and socialization. Our stories often morph into our myths. Rising to the societal quality of myth makes these stories appear to be true (if for no other reason than they are so often repeated), and thus usually end up as unquestioned truths. We’ve thrown around a few big items; let us define them. By culture, we mean “the social production and reproduction of sense, meaning, and consciousness.”74 By ideology, we mean “a fairly coherent and comprehensive set of ideas that explains and evaluates social conditions, helps people understand their place in society, and provides a program for social and political action.”75 Culture is “the context within which people give meaning to their actions and experiences and make sense of their lives.”76 Germane to our study, culture is “concerned with the production and the exchange of meanings—the giving and taking of meaning—between members of a society or group.”77 Paintings, songs, and movies are a part of the way these meanings are constructed and transmitted. As Michael Shapiro writes, “with the exception of some resistant forms, music, theater, TV weather forecasts, and even cereal box scripts tend to endorse prevailing power structures by helping to reproduce the beliefs and allegiances necessary for their uncontested functioning.”78 A myth is an accepted truth. Myths have power over us because they appear to be neutral and nonpolitical. They are stories (fables) that help us understand the world through the exploits or achievements of others. And so, the stories presented have, in the forms of paintings, songs, and films, comprised and created a set of cultural myths that largely reinforce hierarchy, the dominant ideology of societies. Their power is subtle, often unconscious, yet powerful. They tell us how to behave, what to think, and what is not acceptable. They are agents of socialization and control. And while some are myth-busters, most are myth reinforcers. Utilizing this theoretical lens, we can see a social and political function of art. Art serves the state as art also helps create the state. They are usually tools of power that serve as vehicles for control and dominance. This makes the exceptions even more compelling. When, why, and how do artists develop the strength and vision to speak truth to power? Art as a vehicle for control and a force of liberation. Paradoxes abound. CONCLUSION Stories are important. They help make us more fully human. They help make us into a nation. They fill a need. Where would we be without them? Our next step will be to more fully demonstrate how messages are conveyed via stories. We will do this by first examining how paintings have been employed to tell a political story. We then turn to music to see how political

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music reaches out to us. Finally, we will look at movies and show how powerful a tool in political storytelling they can be. NOTES 1. See: Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Princeton University Press, 1949). 2. The Washington Post calculated Trump’s lies while in office. They totaled 30,573 over four years. “Trump’s False or Misleading Claims Total 30,573 over 4 years,” January 24, 2021 3. Jonathan Haidt, The Righteous Mind (Allen Lane, 2012), 281. 4. Will Storr, The Science of Storytelling: Why Stories Make Us Human and How to Tell Them Better (Abrams Press, 2020), 2. 5. Jonathan Gottschall, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human (Mariner Books, 2013), xiv. 6. Gottschall, p. 3. 7. According to the Motion Picture Association, 2006, cited in Gottschall, p. 3. 8. See: Ian Scott, American Politics in Hollywood Films, 2nd ed. (Edinburgh University Press, 2011), 20 and 88. 9. Will Storr, Science of Storytelling (Abrams Press, 2020). 10. Kindra Hall, Stories That Stick (Harper Collins, 2019). 11. Richard Cohen, Making History: The Storytellers Who Shaped the Past (Simon and Schuster, 2022). 12. Sebastian Kim, Pauline Kollontai, and Sue Yore, Mediating Power: Reconciliation Through Visual Art, Music and Film (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015). 13. See: “Pixar’s 22 Rules of Storytelling,” Aerogramme Writers’ Studio, aerogrammestudio.com/2013/03/07/pixars-22-rules-of-storytelling/ 14. Peter Brooks, Reading for the Plot, quoted in: Peter Brooks, “Seduced by Story: The Use and Abuse of Narrative,” New York Review Books, 2022, p. 1. 15. Jerome Bruner, “The Narrative Construction of Reality,” in Critical Inquiry 18, no. 1, 1991, pp 1–21. 16. See: T. Rutjens Bastiaan and Mark J. Brandt, Belief Systems and the Perception of Reality (Routledge, 2019); and Geoffrey Evans and Robert Anderson, “The Political Conditioning of Economic Perceptions,” The Journal of Politics 68, no. 1, February 2006. 17. Emily Falk, “How Storytelling Can Promote Social Change,” The Los Angeles Times 27, 2021, p. A24. 18. Falk, A24. 19. Rick Shenkman, Political Animals: How Our Stone Aged Brain Gets in the Way of Smart Politics (Basic Books, 2016), 142. 20. Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth (Anchor, 1991); The Hero with a Thousand Faces (New World Library, 2008); and The Hero’s Journey (New World Library, 2014).

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21. Simon Sinek, Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action (Portfolio, 2009). 22. Jonathan Gottschall, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human (Mariner Books, 2012), xiv. 23. Gottschall, p. 30 24. Brian Boyd, On the Origins of Stories (Harvard University Press, 2010). 25. Ted Bauer, “The Neuroscience of Storytelling,” Your Brain at Work, September 30, 2021. 26. Steven Parker, How the Mind Works (W.W. Norton, 1997). 27. Antonio Damasio, Descartes’s Error: Emotions, Reason, and the Human Brain (Penguin, 1994). 28. Annette Simmons, The Story Factor (Basic Books, 2020), 63. 29. Quoted in Simmons, p. 203. 30. Jonah Lehrer, How We Decide (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009), 13. 31. Lisa Cron, Wired for Story (Ten Speed Press, 2012), 2. 32. Cron, p. 2. 33. Cron, p. 8. 34. Steven Pinker, How the Mind Works (Norton, 1997), 4. 35. Quoted in Cron, Wired for Story, 85. 36. Renato Rosaldo, Culture and Truth: The Remaking of Social Analysis (Beacon Press, 1989). 37. Hayden White, “The Value of Narrativity in the Representation of Reality,” Critical Inquiry 7, no. 1, 1980, p. 5. 38. Kevin Durand and Mary K. Leigh, Marxism and the Movies: Critical Essays on Class Struggle in Cinema (McFarland, 2013). 39. Theodore R. Sarbin, Narrative Psychology: The Storied Nature of Human Conduct (Praeger, 1986). 40. Testimony, Leon Panetta, U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, 2011; Quoted in Sean Lawson and Michael K. Middleton, “Cyber Pearl Harbor: Analogy, Fear, and the Framing of Security Threats in the United States, 1991–2016,” First Monday 24, no. 3–4, March 2019. 41. John Gregory Dunne, “The American Raj: Pearl Harbor as Metaphor,” The New Yorker, April 29, 2001. 42. Robert D. Kaplan, “Foreign Policy: Munich versus Vietnam,” The Atlantic, May 2007. 43. Rick Shenkman, Political Animals (Basic Books, 2016), 53. 44. See: Drew Weston, The Political Brain (Public Affairs, 2007), xvi. 45. Rick Shenkman, Political Animals (Basic Books, 2016), 133. 46. Howard Gardener, Leading Minds: An Anatomy of Leadership (Basic Books, 1996), 41. 47. Tim O’Sullivan et. al, Key Concepts in Communication and Cultural Studies (Routledge, 1994), 68. 48. Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures (Basic Books, 1975), AA8. 49. Terrance Ball and Richard Dagger, Political Ideologies and the Democratic Ideal, 2nd ed. (Harper Collins, 1995), 9.

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50. Cynthia Weber, International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction, 5th ed. (Routledge, 2021), 7. 51. Rick Shenkman, Just How Stupid Are We?: Facing the Truth about the American Voter (Basic Books, 2008), 1. 52. Shenkman, p. 11. 53. Rick Shenkman, Political Animals: How Our Stone-Age Brain Gets in the Way of Smart Politics (Basic Books, 2016), 149. 54. Rick Shenkman, Just How Stupid Are We?: Facing the Truth about the American Voter (Basic Books, 2009), 54. 55. See: Jeremy Dauber, American Comics: A History (W.W. Norton, 2021). 56. See: Dixon Wecter, The Hero in America: A Chronicle of Hero-Worship (Scribner’s Sons, 1972). 57. Paul S. Hirsh, Pulp Empire: The Secret History of Comic Imperialism (University of Chicago Press, 2021). 58. See: Frederic Wertham, The Seduction of the Innocent (Amereon, LTD. 2021); first published in 1954. 59. See: Darieck Scott, “Superhero Comics—My Springboard to Envisioning Justice,” The Los Angeles Times, March 21, 2022, p. AII. 60. For a historical review of the political changes in comics, see: Douglas Wolk, All of the Marvels, pp. 332–54. 61. See: Dennis Young, “Superheroes and Violence: What the Punisher Teaches Us about American Politics,” Political Science Now, February 2022, p. 23. 62. Philips, Menaka. “Violence in the American Imaginary: Gender, Race, and the Politics of Superheroes.” American Political Science Review, 2021, pp. 1–4. https:​//​ doi​.org​/10​.1017​/S0003055421000952 63. Young, “Superheroes and Violence,” p. 23. 64. J. Hoberman, “The Comics Cavalcade,” The Nation, February 7–14, 2022, pp. 39–42. 65. See: Karen Kipphoff, “Self and the City: The Politics of Monuments,” Social Analysis 51, no. 1, Spring 2007, pp. 86–95. 66. See: Roger C. Hartley, Monumental Harm: Reckoning with Jim Crow Era Confederate Monuments (University of South Carolina Press, 2021); and Erin L. Thompson, Smashing Statues: The Rise and Fall of America’s Public Monuments (W.W. Norton, 2022). 67. See: ronaldreaganlegacyproject.org/about 68. See: Vance Packard, The Hidden Persuaders Pocket Books, 1975. 69. Cynthia Weber, International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction, 5th ed. (Routledge, 2021), 288. 70. Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (Penguin, 2005). 71. Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures (Hutchinson, 1975), 448. 72. See Weber, p. 2 73. Edmund Morgan, Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America (Norton, 1989).

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74. Tim O’Sullivan, et al., Key Concepts in Communication and Cultural Studies (Routledge, 1994), 68. 75. Terrance Ball and Richard Dagger, Political Ideologies and the Democratic Ideal, 2nd ed. (Harper Collins, 1995), 9. 76. John Tomlinson, Cultural Imperialism: An Introduction (Johns Hopkins, 1991), 7. 77. Stuart Hall, ed. Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices (Sage, 1997), 1–4. 78. Michael J. Shapiro, Reading the Postmodern Polity: Political Theory as Textual Practice (University of Minnesota Press, 1992), 1.

Chapter Two

On Seeing Politics Paintings Telling a Story

Artists have something to say. Be it through sculpture, architecture, painting, music, or writing, humans communicate, we tell stories. In the pre-history era, cave paintings told a story. Later, the oral tradition found us gathered around the fire listening to storytellers regale us with tales of Odysseus, Ajax, Achilles, Agamemnon, Penelope, Athena, and Zeus. These stories entertained and even enlightened. It was a long road from cave paintings to movies to social media. Along the way, artists and storytellers brought us together, gave us common frames of reference, a shared sense of humanity. Movies are a modern art form. And as with the art forms of the past—painting, sculpture, music—it is a mixture of art, commercialism, and expression. To put political art into context, let us briefly examine how seeing (paintings), hearing (music), and watching (movies), in their own ways, may have served as change catalysts or status quo defenders. In this way, we see how across the ages, we humans had a need to express our humanity, fears, hopes, and dreams, and find meaning in the chaos of life. Art has always had a political role. The paintings of Picasso, the music of Wagner, the novels of Trollope, the drawings of Daumier, the stained-glass windows in medieval cathedrals, the cartoons of Nast and Trudeau, demonstrate the link between artist and politics as both critics and defenders of power. Art has often been used to support the in-party, as was the case with Soviet propaganda posters of the Cold War. These striking posters fostered patriotism and devotion to the state. But often, art has been a critic of the status quo, poking and prodding, exposing and challenging power. Why did the Roman emperors insist that their images be stamped on coins?1 A reminder of who was in command? Status quo propaganda? A projection of power? A reminder of the importance of the emperor? An ego trip? Perpetuation of the cult of leadership? 39

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Yes, and yes again. The emperor was the state. And you could never forget or escape that. It was a story, summed up by one picture, strategically placed on an object of value. Walk into Sainte-Chapelle on the Île de la Cité in Paris and be utterly mesmerized. There you will see 1,113 stained glass windows that envelope a small upper chapel, and if you catch the sunlight coming through the windows, you are likely to believe that yes, there is a God, and that she is good. So overpowering is the experience that even the coldest of hearts are likely to melt before the power and beauty of the wall of refracted light. But more is at work here than sheer artistry. The stained-glass windows have a story to tell. Built in the mid-thirteenth century by Louis IX, Sainte-Chapelle’s stained-glass windows were literature for the illiterate masses. They tell us Bible stories, illustrate in ways easily understandable. Sainte-Chapelle also links the French kings to power, God, and reinforce the myth of the divine right of kings. It exudes strength and power and comingles the sacred with the secular. To obey the king is to obey God. I am small and the king is big and powerful. I owe my allegiance to God and king. Images matter.

Figure 2.1.  Sainte-Chapelle Chapel, Paris, France Source: Courtesy of Adobe Stock Images

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ONE PICTURE We are all familiar with the old saying: a picture is worth a thousand words. Indeed, a single image can be etched into our brains, and can, in a single picture, capture the essence of a story. A great photograph reveals more than merely the image. It tells the story within the photograph. Great art takes us beyond the object of our observation: it imparts meaning, offers insights, takes us beyond ourselves. Some of the great photographs—several of them appear in this book—speak volumes to us and tell a story we can fully comprehend. They capture a truth in a way words do not. Think of the iconic images that reflected and/or shaped history. Dorothea Lange’s 1936 Depression-era picture of a forlorn mother sitting next to her children, looking outward, her eyes, seemingly begging for help, or Joe Rosenthal’s picture of American soldiers raising the American flag on Iwo Jima (1945) during World War II, Alfred Eisenstadt’s photo of an American sailor kissing a woman in Times Square in celebration of the end of the Second World War, or the 1968 Olympics picture of US runners Tommie Smith and John Carlos, standing on the victory platform, heads down, arms extended in the Black Power Fist, silently but powerfully making a statement about racism in the United States. These photos capture the zeitgeist of their times, spoke to viewers, told a story. A great picture, one great image, can tell a complete story. When we see the sailor kiss that woman, we immediately know the story, and even in a small way, share in their joy. And when we see the lifting of the flag at Iwo Jima, we already know—feel—the essential elements of the story. John F. Kennedy’s November 1963 assassination produced several memorable images, from the pictures of Kennedy in his limousine, to the shock, seen on live television, of Jack Ruby shooting assassination-suspect Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas. The war in Vietnam produced a series of iconic photographs that received widespread global coverage and revealed both the horror of war, and in particular, the horrors of the war in Vietnam and the impact at home as protests led to violence. Two of the most powerful and haunting photographs to come out of the Vietnam War are the 1968 Eddie Adams photograph of South Vietnam’s General Nguyan Loan, chief of police, shooting Viet Cong suspect Nguyan Van Lem in broad daylight on a Saigon street. And perhaps the most unforgettable picture of the war is photographer Nick Ut’s horrific pictures of a young South Vietnamese girl, running naked toward the camera, a victim of a US napalm attack.

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Figure 2.2.  Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California Source: Photo by Dorothea Lange for FSA, 1936

I have direct memories of these times and these pictures, and even today, fifty years later, they bring me back to that time, that war, that horror. Is there a more iconic or more powerful a message/story to come from one picture than the 1989 photo of a lone protestor in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, standing in front of a Chinese tank? One man, with enormous courage, stands up to the Chinese government and military. One man, taking a

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Figure 2.3.  Australian silver medalist Peter Norman, left, stands on the podium as Americans Tommie Smith, center, and John Carlos raise their gloved fists in 1968. Source: (AP)

stand, making a difference. The photo was shocking and inspiring; a celebration of individual courage in the face of power. What a powerful story it told. The war in Iraq produced more than its share of memorable pictures: a crowd of Iraqis toppling a statue of Saddam Hussein, a protestor throwing a shoe at George W. Bush, US troops rolling into Baghdad, but it was the shocking 2004 photographs out of the Abu Ghraib prison that sickened the world and exposed the cruelty of occupation, the sadistic descent of soldiers in war, and the poverty of US policy and leadership. The liberators had become the oppressors. The self-proclaimed good guys became monsters. If the Tiananmen Square photo was the epitome of individual courage in the face of great danger, the January 6, 2021, insurrection in which supporters of Donald Trump stormed the US Capitol in an effort to overturn a democratic

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Figure 2.4.  Tank Man, Tiananmen Square, Beijing, China Source: Photo by Jeff Widener, AP, June 1989

election, captured in pictures, such as the “Q-Anon Shaman” parading in the capitol, the essential nature of the assault against democracy. The pictures of the insurrectionists destroying property, assaulting police officers, defecating in the US Capitol, shouting “Kill Mike Pence” while holding a hangman’s noose, of breaking into offices and threatening elected officials—all told the story in graphic detail. EUROPEAN PAINTING AND THE CONNECTION WITH POWER Artists try to find meaning and express universal hopes and fears. They help us “see” in a different way. They also help us make sense of the world. From the Greek plays of Aristophanes to the stained-glass windows of the great cathedrals, to the imposing architecture of the Bauhaus school, to the expressionist paintings of Ensor, art speaks to us. Art has always been linked to power, either in support or opposition. Artists react to conditions in the world around them. Twenty-five hundred years ago, the theater in Athens was a place for entertainment but also for politics. Greek sculpture also spoke to its time. With Winged Victory, Nike, the Greek goddess of victory, has descended to earth to congratulate the Greeks on their

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Figure 2.5.  An unidentified detainee standing on a box with a bag on his head and wires attached to him in this late 2003 file photo at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, Iraq. Source: (AP)

naval victory over Rhodes. This powerful sculpture speaks to beauty and power. It inspires warriors as it celebrates greatness. In ancient Rome, the empire’s power was exhibited through its art. Supreme power was represented in monumental structures such as the Colosseum, the Parthenon, massive domes, all sent a clear message: we have power. In the medieval era, art began to serve powerful and wealthy patrons (e.g., the Medicis of Florence) and the Church. Soaring Gothic cathedrals towered over all, an expression of omnipresence and power. Stained-glass windows told “stories” of the life of Christ, the saints, and of the Bible. The average citizen, though illiterate, could “read” these stories and learn lessons. Obedience to church and state was the result of power and fear. To impress the average commoner with the vast power of the state, and to instill fear

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Figure 2.6.  Supporters of US President Donald Trump, including Jake Angeli, a QAnon supporter known as the QAnon Shaman, protest in the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, in Washington, DC. Source: (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

into them, was the purpose of much of what art was called upon to do. If you disobeyed the Church, a fiery hell awaited you. With Florence’s baptistry, one could be intimidated by the powerful mosaic Judgment Day. Christ sits on his throne observing and judging as, in Hell, the devil devoured the sinners. The fear of God—and of an eternity in hell—could be a powerful motivation and socializing agent. For over 1,200 years, the Catholic Church in Europe held sway over vast swaths of the population. Virtually all the nonelites were illiterate, poor, and, to a large degree, devout. Priests were their contact to the divine, and parishioners were kept dependent on the local priest to interpret the word of God—the Bible—for and to the people. Artists too contributed their talents to subjects divine, and some of the greatest artists—da Vinci, Rembrandt, Caravaggio, Raphael, Michelangelo, El Greco, Titian, Giotto—and some of the greatest art—The Last Supper, The Return of the Prodigal Son, The Calling of St. Matthew, The Cistine Chapel ceiling, Madonna del Prato, Transfiguration, The Tears of Saint Peter, Disputation of the Holy Sacrament—were produced for the Church and to God’s glory. In a world where Church and state each reigned supreme in their domains, what constituted “good government”? Is it that government which governs least? Achieves justice and equality? Advances freedom? Promotes order?

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Figure 2.7.  Hell (c 1225) Source: Baptistry, Florence, Italy

Ambrogio Lorenzetti (1290–1348) tried to answer this question, and his answer, painted between 1337 and 1339, covers the walls of the Sala dei Nove in the Palazzo Pubblico in Siena, Italy. His Allegory of Good and Bad Government, still visible and accessible to visitors, tells the story of how leaders could create good or bad government, and of the impact of such governments on the lives of ordinary citizens. Walking into Sala dei Nove (Salon of Nine) where Siena’s nine executive magistrates met, one is struck by the scope and beauty of the fresco, and peasant and nobleman alike could “read” the frescos and discern Lorenzetti’s message. Lorenzetti’s painting consists of six scenes: Allegory of Good Government, Allegory of Bad Government, Effects of Bad Government in the City, Effects of Bad Government in the Country, Effects of Good Government in the City, and Effects of Good Government in the Country. Each fresco panel reflects the painter’s vision of how civil government impacted the polity. Unusual for its time, the paintings focused on secular rather than strictly religious concerns. For The Allegory of Good Government, six crowned female figures at the feet of the ruler portray the key ingredients of good government: Peace, Fortitude, Prudence, Magnanimity, Temperance, and Justice, with Justice balancing the scales held by Wisdom. In other panels, good government in the city and country are portrayed with commerce, churches, tradesmen, maidens

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dancing—and with a bumper crop and grazing animals—peasants and farmers set in a bucolic setting. Bad government shows us a devil-like tyrant, lording over Justice, which is tied up, and with figures of Cruelty, Deceit, Fraud, Fury, Division, and War surrounding the Tyrant. Above him float Avarice, Pride, and Vainglory. Is this a peaceful republic in which people work in harmony, or a dark prison of war, violence, and injustice? Any citizen of Siena could easily read the message, absorb its lessons, learn from the imagery. These morality plays painted on the walls were institutional, inspirational, and cautionary. It is clear what produces a heaven on earth; it is also clear where the road to hell leads. Titian’s painting An Allegory of Prudence portrays three ages of man: youth, adulthood, and old age. This is represented by three heads, with old age looking to the past, adulthood facing us in the present, and the young man looking toward the future. Below the three faces are three animals: a wolf, a lion, and a dog. Each animal is linked to the three faces above to suggest characteristics encompassed in each age of man. A Latin inscription on the painting reads: “From the past / the present acts prudently / lest it spoil future action.” Thus, we see the mental demands imposed on leaders. The effective leader learns these lessons. Reminiscent of Aristotle’s call for leaders to employ phronesis is the ability to direct action toward the achievement of good policy based on prudence and sound judgment. In a similar way, Machiavelli calls on The Prince to combine the skills of the lion and the fox, exercising power where necessary, and cunning where possible. Titian is producing a manual for good leadership, all in one picture. For centuries, painters served the interests of wealthy patrons and the state. Leaders wanted to be recognized and portrayed as strong, handsome, even intimidating figures. Bold displays of power were common, and Riguad’s Louis XIV portrays the king as the exemplar of power. Dressed in his coronation robe, dripping with the royal regalia, crown and sword on display, here is a “divine right” king, whose power is ordained by God. The painting oozes gravitas and authority and is an excellent example of art—and artists—using their skill in service of the state. At this time (1701), the myth of the divine right of kings was giving way to a new myth—the divine right of the people—but last gasps at grandeur such as Rigaud’s painting of the Sun King still allowed Louis to claim “L’Etat C’Est Moi” (I am the state).2 By the 1800s, democracy was beginning to spread. In a post-Napoleonic age, the powers and prestige of kings declined and “consent” increasingly replaced obedience to the state. New definitions of nationalism were needed. Eugene Delacroix’s 1830 painting Liberty Leading the People portrays Lady Liberty, carrying the French flag into battle. Inspirational, “Marianne,” the symbol of the French Revolution, is both a great work of art, and effective

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Figure 2.8.  Titian, An Allegory of Prudence (c. 1550–1565)

propaganda. This was no king leading an army into battle but was a glorification of the common men and women who held and could use power. And while the painting is not of the French Revolution, but of Paris in the 1830s when King Charles X curtailed civil liberties, it inspired the masses as it reminded them that the people had to fight to reclaim their freedoms. Delacroix’s romanticism married a powerful theme to the toppling of a despotic ruler. Delacroix’s powerful painting, the Napoleon-commissioned Arc de Triomphe (an imposing structure if ever there was one), and JacquesLouis David’s The Coronation of Napoleon (1807) represent efforts to influence politics with art. If, as Shelley wrote, “Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world,” then it can be said of artists that they are the

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unacknowledged influences of the world.3 Napoleon’s coronation is a vivid reminder of the incestuous connection between church and state. As democracies rose, some critics pointed out the danger of mob rule and anarchy as possible and inevitable evolutions or devolution of granting power to the masses. One influential nineteenth-century critic of democracy was expressionist painter James Ensor. A well-functioning democracy places significant demands on its citizenry. The assumption of voter rationality must also be buttressed by a willingness to actively commit to the passage of sound public policy and to participate in shaping the future of the polity. Democracy is an active, not a passive form of government. But are we up to the task? In the late 1880s, as democracies were increasingly being seen as an attractive form of government, critics emerged to sound the alarm: humans were just not cut out to meet the demands of democracy. One of the most prominent and influential of such critics was James Ensor, the Belgian painter. Ensor, considered one of the first expressionist painters, offered a critique of both the public’s failure to defer to the authority of the Church and the state. The rise of democracy was, to Ensor, the rise of anarchy. In Christ’s Entry into Brussels in 1889 (1888), Ensor presents a grotesque carnival mob, singing, marching, drinking, and dancing. It is a mad, magnificent, confused, and confusing scene of anarchistic chaos. Rich in color, it presents Christ entering the city, but amid the madness, Christ is barely recognizable. Lost amid the garish, colorful anarchy of people, puppets, and clowns, one has to squint to see Christ, who is all but lost in the crowd. There is

Figure 2.9.  Christ’s Entry Into Brussels, 1889 (1888), James Ensor Source: The Getty Museum, Los Angeles, California, USA

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a marching band, costumed characters, circus performers, masked figures, self-important officials, clerics, and skeletons. It is a mad cacophony of the leering mob, more interested in having fun than in worshipping Jesus. Ensor’s allegorical painting portrays the dilemma of leadership in a mass democracy. Rather than defer to Christ, the mob barely notices him. There are too many distractions, too many entertaining diversions. There is a party going on, a carnival parade, and if the choice is between party or piety, let the parade begin. Christ is not the center of attraction, not the recipient of respect or worship, thus Christ must—in true democratic fashion—compete, persuade, and draw people unto himself. But for Ensor, the party wins, and if that is the case, how can leaders in a democracy do anything but pander to the people? “Thou shalt not” is not as fun as “let’s party,” and if Christ is to win over the people, he must give them what they want—a perfect recipe for self-indulgence and collapse. Is Ensor right? His cause is powerfully made without a word. His picture tells his story. ART CONFRONTS WAR Is it possible to convey to the viewer the horror of war? Can a painting show us the depths of pain and destruction, of human loss, of the utter despair of violence? Or, put another way, can paintings convey the heroism and bravery of young soldiers marching into certain death? Can paintings be pro-war and also anti-war? One of the most powerful artistic depictions of the horrors of war can be seen in Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens’s (1577–1640) 1639 classic The Consequences of War. Today, we are saturated with images of war. Turn on any cable news network and you are likely to see wars and violence in explicit form. But in the seventeenth century, a painting such as The Consequences of War served as an access point for those who were fortunate enough to actually see the painting. One sees Mars, the god of war, in battle armor, emerging from the Temple of Janus. In Rome the gates to the temple were closed, to be opened only in war. And here we see Mars burst through the gates, initiating the bloody conflagration.4 It is impossible to view this painting and not be affected by its power as well as its horror. Francisco de Goya (1746–1828) devoted much of his ample talent to being court painter in Spain. He painted portraits of the rich and powerful, flattering them as he drew his paycheck in their service. But if paying the bills was a necessity, the inner soul of Goya longed not to flatter the powerful, but to champion the oppressed.

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On May 3, 1808, France invaded Spain. The French met the Spanish on Madrid’s main square, Puerta del Sol, where the Spaniards were brutally crushed, and their leaders arrested. In the middle of the night, some of the Spanish prisoners were taken before a firing squad and killed. Goya’s The Third of May is an effort to come to grips with the brutality of war and the barbarity of the warrior. One can’t help but view this painting and ask, along with the pleading soon-to-be victim whose arms are raised in resignation as he kneels before the firing squad, seemingly asking: “why?” Note the dark tones and shadowy imagery, and yet the pending victim is bathed in light, Goya asking us to put ourselves in his place. Francisco Goya’s print, The Disasters of War, (1810–1820), is built upon the artist’s personal observations of war and includes gruesome battle scenes, torture, and the human suffering that comes with war. Of these prints, Peter Schjeldahl writes: Torture that make death seem merciful. Each of the plates zooms in on what the artist deemed an innate human capacity for savagery that never expires, persisting at a simmer in peacetime. What is it like to suffer atrocity and alternatively, to perpetrate it? Goya generally plays no favorites among the parties to his nightmarish scenarios.5

Figure 2.10.  The Third of May, 1808 (1814), Francisco de Goya Source: Prado Museum, Madrid, Spain

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We remember the lush paintings of Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens for his voluptuous female nudes. Rubens iconized as he also popularized the vision of a woman as plump and curvy. We even have a name for such women: Rubenesque. But there is also a darker side to Rubens. Antwerp, Belgium, Rubens’s home, had been a war-torn city. Religious wars plagued Europe, and Rubens believed that art could change the world. Rather than depict the horrors of war in his home country, Rubens chose a Biblical theme, The Massacre of the Innocents, in which, through two paintings, he depicts the biblical massacre in Bethlehem as described in the Gospel of Matthew (2:13–18). The lush, lurid painting is so powerful, so frightening, so disturbing that Rubens hoped it could make people turn away from war. But even masterpieces succumb to the vicissitudes of realpolitik. Pablo Picasso, wishing to support the 1930s Spanish government against a fascist takeover, racked his brain in search of an appropriate subject for his paintings to be exhibited at the Paris World’s Fair. He decided to tell the story of Guernica, where on April 26, 1937, German and Italian aircrafts destroyed the city. Guernica held no military targets and was of no real strategic importance. The fascists were determined to terrorize the nationalists who supported the republic. Thousands of civilians were massacred. It was a brutal act designed to instill fear, as well as impress, the Spanish people of the power the fascists could wield, and the lengths they would go to in their quest for victory. News of the bombing of Guernica reached Picasso, then living in Paris. He was outraged and decided that this would be the subject of his painting. The world would see the true nature of the fascist beasts. Picasso turned his anger into great art, creating perhaps the most powerful artistic indictment of war, his 1937 classic Guernica. Picasso was a complex and provocative man, who thought highly of himself. He once said that, When I was a child, my mother said to me, “If you become a soldier, you’ll be a general. If you become a monk, you’ll end up as Pope. Instead, I became a painter and wound up as Picasso.6

Picasso had a significant impact in the world of art and was as famous as he was infamous. In 1937, a delegation of Spanish politicians approached Picasso with a proposition. The Paris International Exposition was around the corner, and Picasso was asked to contribute a painting for the Spanish exhibit. But there was a problem. Spain was mired in a civil war pitting the forces of the Spanish republic against the forces of the fascist, Generalissimo Francisco Franco, who sought to topple the government. In portraying the barbarity of the fascists, Picasso hoped not only to have his painting serve the immediate goal of generating opposition to Franco, but in a broader sense, he also hoped to expose the honor of war in general.

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Figure 2.11.  Guernica (1937), Pablo Picasso Source: Centro de Certe Reina Sofia, Madrid, Spain

Figure 2.12.  Massacre in Korea 1950, Pablo Picasso Source: Musée Picasso, Paris, France

The story may be apocryphal, but when a general saw Guernica, he is said to have turned to Picasso and asked, “Did you do this?” to which Picasso responded, “No, you did.”7 Guernica is universal. It speaks to the horror of all wars. In 1985, a tapestry of Guernica was hung at the United Nations, just outside the entrance to the meeting room of the Security Council. Ruben’s The Consequences of War (1637–1638) and The Massacre of the Innocents (1611–1612), discussed earlier, Copley’s The Death of Major Pierson, 6 January 1781 (1783), John Singer Sargent’s Gassed (1919), Dali’s The Face of War (1940), and Picasso’s Massacre in Korea (1951) all dealt

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with the impact of war in vivid, even frightening explicitness. Was the stark reality of war, to the extent it is possible to capture such horrors, actually put on canvas for us to see and even feel? Did these portraits of war matter? Did they make a difference? PHOTOGRAPHS OF WAR Photographs capture a moment. They are “snapshots.” They also tell a story. And yes, they too can be worth a thousand words. Photographs of war tell the story of the glory and gore of war. They ask us to confront the reality of war as we look deeply into ourselves and try to resolve the Nietzchian dilemma: “Beware that when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster . . . for when you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.”8 I am a (now aging) baby boomer. Born in 1950, I was raised on a steady diet of movies depicting World War II as “the good war.” We fought for a noble cause (freedom) against a brutal monster (Hitler). My heroes were handsome, rugged Americans who fought bravely against the odds and emerged victorious: “we saved civilization.” Heady stuff. National pride, the manly virtues of war, the embrace of violence, the heroic quality of being an American told a story that we were special. And we children (boys) went out and played war games, or cowboys (we all wanted to be the cowboys) and Indians. I was raised to admire violence, practice it, and accept it, and the girls were left out and left behind. We were young men, preparing to take our places in the ruling class. Who could not be stirred by the ironic photo of the raising of the American flag over Iwo Jima? I didn’t know where Iwo Jima was, but I knew deep down inside that this was a moment of majesty. We Americans, working together, could defeat any foe. It was an inspirational story. And the result? Victory. And with victory came the fruits of our labors. The Kiss captures the utter joy of the moment of victory. We had sacrificed for a high ideal and we won. These two pictures speak to the glory and benefits of war. But a third picture, the Hiroshima mushroom cloud photo, was the close of one story and the beginning of another. Haunting, evocative, this single picture tells the story of the fears of the Cold War, when the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, played a dangerous game of nuclear brinksmanship, holding humanity hostage to the potential end of life on the planet. The hope and optimism visible in the pictures of the first story gave way to the fear and dystopian alarm of the post–World War II era. The two faces of war, captured in three photographs.

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THE VIETNAM WAR IN FOUR PICTURES The War in Vietnam began slowly as a proxy war in the drama of US-Soviet Cold War confrontation. When in the 1950s, the French left Vietnam, unable to sustain the costs of empire, the United States took over as the North sided with the Soviets, and the South became an American power. First Eisenhower, then Kennedy, slowly, quietly increased the US presence in Vietnam, but it was Lyndon Johnson who made Vietnam “our war.” Initially, public opinion—for those people who even had an opinion— was pro intervention. But slowly, as the war went badly and as the lies of the Johnson administration were recognized and the “credibility gap” was exposed, opinion turned. Three photos were eye-openers for a public that reluctantly began to pay attention to the war. In the first, a Buddhist monk, sat in the middle of a street, poured gasoline on himself, and lit himself on fire! This horrible act of self-immolation shocked viewers. It impressed upon a largely uninterested American public that this was no World War II, no glorious protector against an oppressor—this was something more and something different. The second photo—of a South Vietnamese officer shooting a suspected spy on the streets of Saigon—was also quite shocking. This is what “the bad guys” did, not our allies; this is what America fought against.

Figure 2.13.  The Killing of Nguyen Van Lem. Photo by Eddie Adams Source: AP/Briscoe Center for American History, February 1, 1968

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Figure 2.14.  The June 8, 1972 file photo taken by Huynh Cong “Nick” Ut, with 9-year-old Kim Phuc, after an aerial napalm attack on suspected Viet Cong hiding places. Source: Photo by Nick Ut, AP, June 8, 1972

The third photo, sometimes referred to as “napalm girl,” shows the human consequences, the collateral damage of war. A South Vietnamese girl, the victim of a napalm drop by US planes, her clothes burned off, her body savaged by napalm, runs in the road in search of help. I was in high school when these pictures went public. They were a wake-up call for a self-centered jock who thought only of girls and baseball. They compelled me to engage, to think, to put the war on my radar. I had merely assumed the United States was the good guy. That is the result of—in part at least—the movies, the stories on which I was raised. These photos got my attention. The story they told stood in stark contrast to the stories of my youth. They got me to think (and to change). Lost innocence is a gut-wrenching experience. These photographs changed me, and they changed many others. In college, I became a leader of the anti-war movement. I demanded that my country live up to the high ideals and lofty aspirations I admired from the stories of my youth. This was not who we were; we were better than this. A final photograph that tells a story . . . After the terrorist attack against the United States on September 11, 2001, the United States declared war against terrorism. It was a new kind of war

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against a new kind of enemy. War is hell and following high-minded ideals and practices in war may, at times, prove self-defeating. But here, we are advised to remember Nietzsche’s warning about becoming the monsters we wish to destroy. The photograph, one of many horrifying pictures of harsh prisoner treatment at the U.S. prison in Abu Ghraib in Iraq were released in 2004 and sent shock waves through the United States and the world. We were torturing prisoners! In trying to defeat monsters, we had become the monsters. Paintings and photographs of war told the stories of war. They etched themselves into our consciousness. They mattered. These photographs reveal both the power of stories and the power of photos to tell stories. They are, I would agree, more impactful than the arguments made in policy papers or persuasive essays. Singer Rod Stewart was correct: “Every picture tells a story, don’t it?” SKEWERING THE CORRUPT AND VENAL Honoré Daumier (1808–1879) was a multitalented artist, perhaps best known for his drawings and caricatures. Daumier’s drawings served as political broadsides against the pompous and powerful. He skewered his victims with wit and skill, highlighting hypocrisy and the self-importance of those in power. In Gargantua, Daumier depicts Louis Philippe I, King of France sitting on his throne, being fed by an assembly line of money taken from the poor. Cartoons are perhaps the most accessible of art forms. They are unintimidating, easily understood, and widely available. The average citizen—many of whom were illiterate at the time Daumier was drawing—could not read, but they could see and understand pictures. American caricaturist Thomas Nast (1840–1902) did to American plutocrats what Daumier did to the French. Nast’s cartoons appeared in newspapers of the day, and one particularly biting cartoon led New York boss of Tammany Hall William “Boss” Tweed to complain, “Let’s stop these damn pictures. I didn’t care so much what the papers write about—my constituents can’t read—but damn it, they can see pictures.” The Mexican muralists of the 1920s and ’30s brought art to the people by putting it up on the walls. Primarily focused on the rights of poor workers as they faced the dehumanizing faces of industrialization, they used large public frescoes to concentrate attention on the conditions of the proletariat. History paintings and worker exposes were their focus, and they were able to reach the workers by way of massive works of art placed in high density locations. Diego Rivera, along with Frida Kahlo, represented the movement and became spokespeople for the masses. Rivera’s Man at the Crossroads (1934),

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a mural completed for the lobby of New York City’s Rockefeller Center but which was removed shortly after it was put up, included images of Lenin and of the Soviet May Day Parade. Is it any wonder that it was taken down? Did Rivera really believe that this political slap in the face to capitalism would remain gracing the wall of a Rockefeller property? But the controversy surrounding the removal caused a sensation. Nelsen Rockefeller ordered the fresco destroyed before it was completed. A HERO FOR A NEW NATION At its founding, the United States was a country without a history, without a national religion, without a history of art and literature to identify as “ours.” We had no king or royal family, no national religion. In short, we lacked the traditional trappings of national identity. With virtually no past to draw upon, the new nation needed symbols of nationhood, something to bind us together, a unifying story. We craved symbols and icons, identifiable sources of inspiration. Enter George Washington. The myth of George Washington began even before his death. But after he died, an apotheosis took place, elevating Washington to iconic, almost sacred status.9 The new nation invested itself in the person of Washington. He came to symbolize the nation itself. This provided the new nation with a clear symbol of itself and a figure behind whom the nation could rally. The Apotheosis of Washington, a fresco placed in the US Capitol dome after the Civil War, portrayed Washington as the American Cincinnatus—the Roman statesman and military leader to whom the Senate made temporary dictator and who, after vanquishing Rome’s foes, willingly gives all power back to the Senate, after which Cincinnatus “returns to the plough.” The lesson was apropos to the new republic. It also fit Washington, who could have been king, and to whom the nation invested its hopes and trust. Washington too returned to the plough, foregoing power in favor of the preservation of a constitutional republic. It was a valuable lesson and an important story for the new nation. Washington became the symbol of a nation desperately in need of unifying symbols. The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution became our sacred texts, and George Washington became our unifying political icon. The fresco portrays Washington being carried up to Heaven by the goddesses Liberty and Victory. And yet, in embracing Washington as Cincinnatus, the citizenry also accepted dictatorship, albeit temporary. The hunger for strong leadership, for a hero who would save us, is thus embedded in the iconography of the United States.

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Figure 2.15.  The Apotheosis of Washington by John James Barralet (1802–1816)

Over time, America’s political identity began to develop, and art played a seminal role in helping to shape that identity. Painter Edward Hopper (1882–1967) captured a truth about America in his paintings of solitude and loneliness. A country founded in celebration of freedom and individual liberty, Hopper exposed the dark underbelly of individualism: solitude, loneliness, the abuse of community. What scholar Robert B. Putnam pointed out

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in his classic book Bowling Alone10 was artistically offered by Hopper whose genius found expression in his telling the story of alienation and solitude. As Peter Schjeldahl writes: Aloneness is his great theme, symbolizing America: insecure selfhoods in a country that is only abstractly a nation. E pluribus unum, a magnificent ideal, thuds on “unum” every day throughout the land. Only law—we’re a polity of lawyers—confers unity on the United States, which might sensibly be a Balkans of regional sovereignties had the Civil War not been so awful as to remove that option come what may.11

Hopper’s visual storytelling allows us as individuals to be drawn into a community of solitude; alone together. Atomized citizens, hungry for community and connection, sharing a story of our common isolation. Schjeldahl asks: Can you pledge patriotic allegiance to a void? Hopper shows how, exploring a condition in which, by being separate, we belong together. You don’t have to like the idea, but, once you’ve truly experienced this painter’s art, it is as impossible to ignore as a stone in your shoe.12

Hopper’s 1942 classic Nighthawks portrays a diner later in the evening. The diners sit at the counter surrounded by the dark, lifeless city outside. We are intruders into this private scene of loneliness where the background is stark, and no human activity is evident. We are given access to this starkness and the unwelcome and uninvited viewer feels both a part of this loneliness, even as we observe from a distance. Nighthawks was foreshadowed by Hopper’s 1927 piece Automat, where we see a lone woman seated at an automat (a cafeteria) where she is alone and looks downcast. Her surroundings are stark and lifeless, with a small arrangement set behind her. We immediately identify with her, can feel her pain, wonder if that, too, is our fate. TAKING IT TO THE STREETS Today, the accessibility problem has been all but solved. Where few had access to the great museums to see works of art, today, via social media, the internet, and other forms of connectivity, I can—at the push of a few buttons—bring the world (and the art world) into my living room. The democratization of art means that artists can reach a wide audience for paintings, music, videos, and so forth. The world is at our fingertips. Even street art (murals, graffiti, etc.) can be accessed.

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Street art—art for the masses—brings art to the people. The works of Banksy, Keith Haring, and Robbie Conal are known across the globe. They tell stories. Conal’s goal is often to “afflict the privileged.” His posters appear all over Los Angeles streets, appearing frequently at LA’s Track 16 art gallery (and are distributed worldwide via social media), as he rails against corrupt and venal politicians, the homophobic, sexism, corruption, and war. Asked about his controversial art, Conal directly responded to an interviewer who questioned him on his often-grotesque portrayals: It’s not interesting to me. It’s the way it is. These people are grotesque. The corrugation of their flesh is a metaphor for the corruption of their souls.13

THE PICTURE MATTERS The struggle for equal rights has been a grueling, often bloody confrontation with those in power who wished to maintain the status quo and their place at the top of the heap. Rights weren’t “given.” They had to be fought for. The modern civil rights movement began in the 1950s and reached a peak in the mid-1960s. One of the most powerful images from the US civil rights movement is Norman Rockwell’s The Problem We All Live With (1964). The painting features six-year-old Ruby Bridges being escorted to an all-white New Orleans school by US Marshals. Because of the threat of violence, school desegregation required the intervention of the federal government. The simple innocence of a child is contrasted with the ugliness of the racist graffiti etched on the wall behind her and the utter and stark simplicity speaks volumes. Rockwell was best known for chronicling the everyday normalities of life in White America. His was a story of small-town America, freckle-faced smiling children, and strong families. But even in this idyllic world, Rockwell was compelled to show the ugliness of racism. CONCLUSION In the modern era, a transformation took place. “Seeing” meant more than merely observing pictures. Television, movies, and other media now flood us with images bombarded across screens large and small. Preceding movies, paintings were the primary way stories were told. And the great artists often told political stories. Artists are often among the first to see and “speak.” And in different eras, different modes of expression were used to highlight power and poverty,

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oppression and war, reality and hope. But paintings are one-dimensional. Artists used what they had. Today, we have a vast array of tools, forms of expression, and ways to reach an audience. Music and movies are two popular and powerful tools of expression and storytelling. NOTES 1. Mary Beard, Twelve Caesars (Princeton University Press, 2021). 2. Timothy Luke, Museum Politics: Power Plays at the Exhibition (University of Minnesota Press), 2002 3. Percy Bysshe Shelley, “A Defense of Poetry,” Essays, Letters from Abroad (London, Edward Moxin, 1821). 4. Jason Fargo, “War’s Enormity Beyond Words,” The New York Times, July 31, 2022, p. 10, Sunday Edition. 5. Peter Schjeldahl, “Facing War: How Artists Have Pictured Conflict,” The New Yorker, March 21, 2022, p. 64. 6. Quoted in Robert Dilenschneider, Decisions (Citadel, 2020), 23. 7. Dilenschneider, 33. 8. Frederick Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil. 9. Casey Cep, “How Divine: Reconsidering the Stories of Men Supposedly Mistaken for Gods,” The New Yorker, December 13, 2021. 10. Robert B. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (Touchstone Books, 2001). 11. Peter Schjeldahl, “Apart: Edward Hopper’s Solitude,” The New Yorker, June 8 and 15, 2020, p. 77. 12. Schjeldahl, 77. 13. Caroline A. Miranda, “Taking It to the Streets,” The Los Angeles Times, August 2, 2022, Calendar, p. E3.

Chapter Three

On Hearing Politics Music Talks Politics

Music has always had a social role. Across time and cultures, music has been as important as it is ubiquitous. And songs tell stories, stories of lost love, injustice, racism, hope, despair, and outrage. Music has staying power. Think of that song that keeps playing in your head that you just can’t get rid of, the shared “our song” in a relationship, the TV theme song with which you are so familiar, the song that expresses your anger or angst—music is ubiquitous and lasting in our lives. “Songs are emotionally charged and brief, so we remember them whole: the melody, the hook, the lyrics, where we were, what we felt. And they are emotionally adhesive, especially when they’re encountered in their youth.”1 Music touches us on many levels. It soothes the savage beast, inspires unity (e.g., Verdi’s Nabucco, Act III, “Va Pensiero,” 1884), gets us angry (Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit), makes us dance and sing and tap our feet (“Mambo No. 5” or Bruno Mars’s “Finesse” or “Uptown Funk”). It gets inside us. In fact, we arrive to this world with music: a fetus recognizes the mother’s heartbeat while still in the womb. And music has often played a role in politics. Artists are often at the forefront of political movements as their songs can highlight injustice or violence, promote freedom, or oppose the elites of society.2 They are sometimes the voices for the young as they confront the establishment (e.g., The Who’s, “My Generation”). They can be a catalyst for change. From protest songs to patriotic anthems, music is deeply entwined with politics.3 Plato and Aristotle spoke of the centrality of music in the creation of noble souls in a civilized society.4 It is worth noting that the popular ’90s Swedish band Ace of Base’s song “The Sign” contains several allusions to Pluto’s famous allegory of the cave. Plato saw a distinction between our passions, emotions and appetites, and intellect and reason. Our emotions bind us to a material world where we become slaves to the pursuit of pleasure. But the 65

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search for truth demands that we reject emotion in favor of reason. By way of contrast, Tolstoy believed that the soul was closely connected to artistic expression, and that such expression binds the individual to others.5 Plato expressed grave concern over the effects of music. In a dialogue with Glaucon, he debates the role of music in his ideal Republic, governed by an elite class of philosopher kings: “Which are the mourning modes? You’re musical. You tell me.” “The Mixolydian,” he said. “The Syntonolydian. That sort of thing.” “Should these be banned, then?” I asked. “After all, they are no use even to women—if we want them to be good women—let alone to men.” “They certainly should . . . ” “Which of the modes, then, are appropriate to luxury and parties?” “There are some Ionian modes,” he said, “and again Lydian, which are called relaxed.” “Will these by any use to men of a warlike disposition?” “No,” he said. “So it looks as if that leaves you with the Dorian and Phyrgian.” “I don’t know about modes,” I said. “Leave me the mode which can most fittingly imitate the voice and accents of a brave man in time of war, or in any externally imposed crisis. When things go wrong, and he faces death and wounds, or encounters some other danger, in all these situations he holds out to the end in a disciplined and steadfast manner. Plus another mode for someone engaged in some peaceful, voluntary, freely chosen activity . . . these two modes, then: one for adversity and one for freely chosen activity, the modes which will best imitate the voices of the prudent and of the brave in failure and success. Leave me those.” “Leave you, in other words, with precisely the two I suggested just now,” he said. “That means we shan’t want an enormous range of strings, and every possible mode, in our songs and melodies.” “No, I think not,” he said . . . “Ye dogs!” I said. “Without meaning to, we have purged the city we said was too luxurious.”6

Plato feared the emotional power of music to move, even persuade, an audience. The people might be moved to become a thoughtless mob. For as he warned, “The modes of music are never disturbed without unsettling of the most fundamental political and social conventions.”7 Ah, the power of music.

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There are two ways that music conveys political context. Music can be “representational,” directly communicating a message intended by the composer to make a clear political statement. Green Day’s “American Idiot” (2004), Public Enemy’s “Fight the Power” (1989), Radiohead’s “Idioteque” (2000), and Gil Scott-Heron’s “The Revolution Will Not be Televised” (1971) serve as examples of music with explicit political messages. Political messages can also be communicated through “associational” music, as when a group or movement seizes upon a song that they feel speaks to their goals. A gory example of this can be seen when the German Nazi Party embraced the music of Beethoven as expressing their ideology. George Washington recognized the importance of music during the American Revolution by issuing a general order which noted that “Nothing is more agreeable, and ornamental than good music; every officer, for the credit of his corps, should take care to provide it.”8 Rousseau observed that music was “capable of acting physically on the body,”9 adding that “sounds act on us . . . as signs of our affection, of our sentiments.”10 And Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice reminds us: The Man who has not Music in his Soul, or is not touch’d with Concord of sweet sounds, If fit for Treasons, Strategems, and Spoils, The Notions of his Mind are dull as Night, And his affections dark as Erebus: Let no such Man be trusted.

Adorno, who on top of being an influential philosopher, was also a musicologist and composer, believed music was a commodity of capitalism that purified citizens while challenging the status quo.11 At first, music appeals to our emotions; we feel something stirring within. Then, perhaps, it appeals to reason; it tells a story or seeks to persuade or enlighten.12 As Fredrich Nietzsche reminds us, “We listen to music with our muscles.”13 That is, it gets inside us, and reaches us at a level mere political discourse cannot. But if music is important, ubiquitous, and consequential, we might also ask “how do music and politics meet and mix?” Music played a significant role in the politics of the 1960s14 and the anti-war movement (Buffalo Springfield’s “Something Happening Here, or For What It’s Worth,”1967); in the Arab Spring (Rapper El General is often credited with helping to spark the uprising in Tunisia); in contemporary politics, The Dixie Chicks, who were embroiled in the anti–George W. Bush politics of the 2000s); Bono and Bob Geldof became leaders in the humanitarian efforts of recent years and songs like, “Do They Know It’s Christmas” in

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2018, and “Sunday Bloody Sunday” in 1983. “We Shall Overcome” became an anthem for Black liberation in America, sung eventually by Black and white Americans. Our shared musical experiences can unify and mobilize. It can energize and inspire. They can be rites of celebration and ceremony, anger and hope, love and politics.15 From Verdi to Rousseau, Pussy Riot to the Sex Pistols, Public Enemy to Run the Jewels, music has addressed political questions, supported as well as—at times—condemned the status quo, and has been used to manipulate citizenry as well as inspire revolutions.16 Music can be used to inspire people to action, question authority, press for change. Jacques Attali asserts that music is prophetic as it calls for change in society.17 CLASSICAL There was a time when opera and classical music appealed both to the masses and the elites of society. Mozart’s comic operas had to display a highbrow as well as a lowbrow appeal, and while we often think of the great love stories in opera—La Bohème, Verdi’s La Traviata, and Aïda—the operatic world was also entranced and entertained by John Adams’s Nixon in China, Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, Beethoven’s Fidelio, Verdi’s Don Carlo, and Britten’s Billy Budd. Beethoven’s third symphony—originally titled “Bonaparte”—went through a name change in 1804 after Napoleon crowned himself emperor.18 In Verdi’s Nabucco, a chorus of Hebrew slaves sing a stirring rallying cry to Italians, calling for the unity of the Italian people and the overthrow of Austrian and French rule.19 No aspect of music has, or can, escape the drama of politics, and, at times, the connection is direct, as was the case with Schoenberg’s Ode to Napoleon, a satire about tyranny and oppression, and also Barraud’s Numance, written in support of anti-Nazi resistance. Others are more subtle and obtuse, as is the case with Britten’s Gloriana.20 PATRIOTIC MUSIC It will surprise no one that a vast swath of music is devoted to flaming the heartstrings of patriotism. “My Country Tis of Thee,” or “God Bless America” inspire devotion and majesty, and “God Save the Queen” stirs the passions of Brits. Our souls are stirred even by the almost-impossible-to-sing “Star-Spangled Banner.” As corny as these songs may be, they also carry

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meaning and gravitas. Such songs unite us, help make us one nation. They are unifying stories that help make us who we are as a nation. Patriotic music is often used to beat the drum of war. Wars themselves serve as unifying forces, and patriotic music reinforces sentiments abroad in the land.21 In this way, music can inspire as well as enable martial activities. Of course, it is easy to see how patriotic music could morph into propaganda as the Cold War–era patriotic songs of the Soviet Union indicate or even how American World War II songs sometimes crossed the line. America has a long history of using political music for patriotic ends. During the American Revolution, Oscar Brand’s music of revolution such as “Bunker Hill” and “Granny Wales” were written to motivate and inspire revolutionary fervor. And Civil War songs such as “Dixie” and “Battle Hymn for the Republic” served a similar purpose. Friedrich Hecker, a German revolutionary who later became a Yankee colonel in the American Civil War, noticed how powerful a tool music could be in recruiting volunteers: Not every man is capable of being enthused through intellectual arguments, since for most it is the sensual dimension—in the noblest sense of the word— which is dominant. Feeling, emotion, and the imagination are the guides which lead hi to that hallowed place from which human rights, the dignity of man and liberty can be seen clearly. On learning a political song for the first time, he sings it with irrepressible joy in the rapture or fervour of the moment, but in those quiet times in which a man contemplates himself or is absorbed in dreams, and while walking here and there, the song re-echoes in his soul. The ideas which it unfolds are clear and vivid, both appealing in themselves and serving to awaken further thoughts. That which was acquired unconsciously or through sensory attraction then gains a nucleus, a form and an enduring existence: the song becomes his lodestar and he becomes politicized . . . Through the mellow tones of song, through its fierce chords, through its passion and fury ideas surge up and down and are inscribed on the depths on the heart. The greatest truths, the deepest ideas of political thought—as if by a process of distillation—attain an unalloyed clarity, becoming the purest gold of the human heart and the inalienable property of the individual.22

Italian nationalism was bolstered by the music of Giuseppe Verdi (1813– 1901) whose work came to represent both national unity and national identity for the nascent Italian nation. During his lifetime, Italy was transformed from a collection of small city-states into a unified nation.

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Verdi sought “risorgimento” or unity among the separate city-states. The year 1848 saw revolutionary warfare with calls for national unity under a united Italy. Verdi pressed the issue in 1849 with the opera La Battaglia di Legnano (The Battle of Legnano). This opera told the story of the historic 1176 Battle of Legnano, where an alliance of Italian city-states (Verona, Padua, Venice, and others, referred to as the “Lombard League”), defeated Germany’s Frederick I (whom the Italians referred to as “Barbarossa”). Verdi was calling on his contemporaries to fight, as their ancestors did, to both resist foreign domination, and move toward national unity. Perhaps nowhere is Verdi’s impact more powerfully seen than in the song “Va Pensiero” from the opera Nabucco (1841). Here, the chorus, comprised of Jewish slaves, sings a haunting song of unity against grave odds. It soon became the unofficial national anthem of Italian unity. THE BEATLES: “YOU SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTION” The 1960s was a time of countercultural revolution. The establishment was challenged by the civil rights movement, the budding environmental and women’s rights movements, a free-speech revolution, the rise of hippies and yippies, the intensification of the anti-war (Vietnam) protests, and a revolution in music. And while the protest songs of Bob Dylan gave depth and poetic form to this revolution, it was the Beatles who popularized as well as led us musically from pop to hard edge, and cultural compliance to revolutionary change. Music historian Ian MacDonald summed up the Beatles’s role in this transformation: The spirit of that era disseminated itself across generations, suffusing the Western world with a sense of rejuvenating freedom comparable to the joy of being let out of school early on a sunny afternoon. Though ultimately the product of influences deeper than pop, the Sixties’ soaring optimism was ideally expressed by it, and nowhere more perfectly than in the music of The Beatles.23

Why were the Beatles so influential and important? They wrote about core truths and universal needs and aspirations. And while their early tunes were pop and catchy, they were also able to tap into the universal, teach us, and reach us. They spoke to what made humans human. Their stories—and “A Day in the Life” remains one of the most powerful stories in pop music history—spoke to our inner selves. Their music both reflected and challenged us. And while Allan Bloom argued that the popular music of the Beatles’s era was the principal cause of “the closing of the

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American mind,”24 in truth, the opposite is probably true. They opened our minds to new possibilities (see John Lennon’s “Imagine”). Paul McCartney and John Lennon, principal songwriters of most of the Beatles’s top songs, captured the imagination and the angst of the era. They also represented a yin and yang of this revolutionary age. Lennon was the cerebral, brooding outsider, unsure of the impact of his work and uncertain society could change. McCartney, by contrast, was more lighthearted and optimistic. He wrote mostly love songs and popular melodies. MacDonald saw the contrast in rather stark terms: In a less narrowly structural sense, the two represented a classic clash between truth and beauty. Seeing music as a vehicle of thought and feeling. Lennon stressed expression at the expense of formal elegance, which held no interest or value for him per se. Intuitive, he cared little for technique and nothing for the rules, which he would go out of his way to break. On the other hand, McCartney, by nature drawn to music’s formal aspects yet wholly untutored, produced technically “finished” work almost entirely by instinct, his harmonic judgement based mainly on perfect pitch and an acute pair of ears.25

The Beatles first came to international acclaim in 1962, but it was in 1964 that “Beatlemania” swept the United States. Their early hits, light, melodic pop songs, made “The Fab Four” international superstars. And their shift from the early, light pop songs to culturally critical songs brought an audience, already hooked on Beatle music, to a new consciousness, bringing us along with them on this magical mystery tour. Their early pop hits seemed increasingly frivolous as the 1960s took shape. The 1963 assassination of John F. Kennedy, the social and political movements that would spring up, the 1968 assassinations of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy, opposition to the war in Vietnam, and the rise of the counterculture affected the Beatles as they began to affect the culture. The “summer of love,” reflected in their 1967 hit “All You Need Is Love,” gave way to the age of protest, and the Beatles shifted from “She Loves You” (1963), to “Revolution” (1968). The Beatles were often accused of being wild radicals who promoted revolution, but a deep reading of their song “Revolution” suggests a more cautious, worried reading to the radical politics of the late 1960s. Responding to the apparent excesses of the youth revolution, John Lennon felt compelled to inject a cautionary dampening of the revolutionary zeal so prevalent in the ’60s. Assuring listeners that everything was going to be all right, Lennon was suspicious of the revolutionary excesses he witnessed:

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You say you want a revolution . . . We all want to change the world

But Lennon is cautious, unwilling to go “all in” on a revolution: But when you talk about destruction Don’t you know that you can count me out

Lennon wanted to “see the plan,” and not support revolution for the hell of it. But if you want mercy for people with minds that hate All I can tell you is brother you have to wait

So where is the revolution? Lennon suggests that we spend less time attacking institutions, cautioning us “you better free your mind instead.” The Beatles, radical revolutionaries or prudent reformists? To Lennon, it was not about overthrowing governments, but a spiritual revolution of the self. Ambivalent about revolutionary change, Lennon asks us to change ourselves. And while John Lennon would cynically dismiss the revolutionary changes of the 1960s (“Everyone dressed up, but nothing changed”26), there can be no doubt that the Beatles were pushing listeners towards caution and increased self-awareness. Lennon’s 1971 classic, “Imagine,” challenges listeners to raise consciousness and imagine a world different from the status quo. “Imagine no possessions” he sings; “imagine no religion.”27 “The people,” Lennon said: “Who are in control and in power and the class system and the whole bullshit bourgeois scene is exactly the same except that there is a lot of middle-class kids with long hair walking around. . . . But apart from that nothing happened except that we all dressed up. The same bastards are in control, the same people are runnin’ everything.”28

SONGS OF PROTEST In America, the tradition of folk music as a means of expressing discomfort goes back to the early days of the republic. “Yankee Doodle” was originally sung by British soldiers as a way of mocking the colonists. The tune comes from an old Irish folk song, and the lyrics, written in the 1750s, were intended to mock the “yankee” simpletons who thought it fashionable to stitch a feather in their caps and “called it macaroni,” a reference to a “dandy.” The backward colonists, tasteless, classless, and clueless, thus, to the British, were rubes and simpletons. Take that!

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Figure 3.1.  The Beatles. Dom Slike. Source: Alamy Stock Photos

However, the colonists got the last laugh. They changed the lyrics a bit and adopted it as their anthem. Music can act both ways. Primarily tools of the left, the excluded, and the exploited, protest songs were accessible, memorable, and unifying. They expressed the common condition of, for example, exploited workers. During the Depression of 1929, with millions out of work, “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime” spoke to the mass of workers, unemployed and without hope. A song about the prominence of the American dream broken, the song took individual anxiety and told the unemployed that this is not your fault; you did everything asked of you, but the system let you down.29 Woody Guthrie (1912–1967) became the unofficial spokesman for the down-trodden working class as the folk singer who addressed the shortcomings of capitalism and celebrated the dignity of the common man. Guthrie was a master storyteller, and he told stories of and to the common man. Born in 1912, Woodrow Wilson Guthrie (named after President Woodrow Wilson) became the spokesman for the downtrodden, the forgotten, and the lost.30 Wanderer, idealist, man of the people, Guthrie “sings the songs of the people,” said author John Steinbeck, “and I suspect that he is, in a way, that people.”31 Daily Worker columnist Mike Gold called him Shakespeare in overalls.

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During the Depression, efforts were made to drum up patriotic support for the American system, but with massive unemployment (estimated to have been between 25 or 35 percent) it was a hard sell. The great songwriter Irving Berlin wanted to lift the spirits of the nation by taking a song he wrote in 1918, “God Bless America,” and when in the hands of popular singer Kate Smith, she belted out a passionate rendition of the song to a weary nation. But Guthrie would not stand for this superficial, cosmetic economic “comb-over.” He wrote “This Land Is Your Land” (1940). The song was an immediate hit, and these two dueling songs—one a celebration of patriotism, the other an anthem to the common man—marched to battle for the soul of the nation. Each told a different story of America.32 Guthrie’s haunting lyrics left a lasting impression: In the shadow of the steeple, I saw my people By the relief office, I saw my people

With this, Guthrie sets the stage. “My people” are suffering. “We,” the people. As they stood there hungry, I stood there asking Is this land made for you and me?

If Woody Guthrie rose up from the people, Peter Seeger came from the elite intellectual class (his father was a Harvard-educated professor of music at the University of California at Berkeley). But Seeger was drawn to the American Everyman, and, like Guthrie, identified with the downtrodden. The old negro spiritual “We Shall Overcome” became an anthem for liberation and the modern/popular version of the song is attributed to Seeger. It was a song of freedom for the unfree and assurance that in spite of the long struggle, we would overcome. In the 1960s, music became an integral part of the anti-war and countercultural movements. Stephen Still’s 1966 classic “For What It’s Worth” became an anthem for the protest movements. And while written as a protest over police closings of Sunset Strip clubs, the song was immediately translated into a youth anthem for a peer group of opposition to “the establishment.”33 Bob Dylan’s 1962 song “Masters of War” reflected popular distrust of the “system” that was drafting young men for war in Vietnam. You that never done nothin’ But build to destroy

Dylan’s indictment of the establishment separates the writer and his fans from the government that is doing something “to us.”

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You play with my world Like it’s your little toy

We are mere playthings to a government that uses and manipulates us, and we are your toys. You put a gun in my hand And you hide from my eyes

More explicit was Country Joe McDonald’s “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-to-Die” (1967) which opened with lines about mothers and fathers sending their children off to Vietnam. Be the first one on your block To have your boy come home in a box.

And after four students were killed by national guardsmen at Kent State University in 1970, Neil Young wrote “Ohio,” an angry, powerful, guitar-driven reaction to the killings: Soldiers are cutting us down . . . How can you run when you know?34

These songs both captured the angst of countercultural youth struggle and served as a catalyst for group solidarity against “the establishment.” The stories these songs told, be it the murder of students at Kent State University or the consequences of the draft and the war in Vietnam, became the kindling for social and political revolution.35 BOB DYLAN Winner of the 2016 Noble Prize for Literature, Robert Allen Zimmerman, aka, Bob Dylan, is—and has been for over fifty years—America’s bard and national poet. Dylan’s many folk ballads, love songs, and protest music influenced multiple generations, and delved into the soul of the nation. Dylan’s poetry (lyrics) speaks to universal needs, fears, hopes, and aspirations. He has been our voice and our conscience for over half a century. In 2022, the Bob Dylan Center opened in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Fans can see Dylan’s archives which contain over 100,000 items. The Dylan Center is two doors down from the Woody Guthrie Center.

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Figure 3.2.  Bob Dylan. Everett Collection Historical. Source: Alamy Stock Photo

In “The Times They Are A-Changin” (1964), Dylan enjoins us to gather round, admit that the waters around us have grown, that they threaten us, so we’d “better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone, for the times they are a-changin.’” He wrote of the death of civil rights activist Medgar Evers in “Only a Pawn in Their Game,” (1963). In “Subterranean Homesick Blues” (1965), he reassures us that you “Don’t need to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows,” and tells us “Don’t follow leaders,” and concludes with “the pump don’t work ’cause the vandals took the handles.” In “Oh Mercy” (1989), he reminds us that “We live in a political world where money walks the plank/life is mirrors, death disappears/up the steps into the nearest bank.” In “It’s Alright Ma” (1965), he wrote of a dark place where it is: Easy to see without looking too far That not much is really sacred.

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In “Union Sundown” (1983), he warns us: Democracy don’t rule the world You’d better get that in your head

He takes us further down by telling us that: This world is ruled by violence But I guess that’s better left unsaid

And in “Absolutely Sweet Marie” (1966), he gives us a paradox to remember: “to live outside the law you must be honest.” After initial success speaking to the politics of the 1960s, Dylan consciously began to back away from the political spotlight. He became more introspective and his music more personal. But his output of political music was astonishing. In 1963, he released “Blowin’ in the Wind,” “Masters of War,” “Oxford Town” (about race), and “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall.” And in 1964 he released “The Times They Are A-Changin,’” “Chimes of Freedom,” “With God on Our Side,” and “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carrol” (on race). And while later he would occasionally enter the political arena with songs such as “Hurricane,” about the unjust imprisonment of Rubin “Hurricane” Carter, and “Political World” (1989), most of his music was of a more personal nature. Dylan’s politics are all the more influential because he so often seems to eschew politics. He is not a leftist broken record who keeps repeating the same refrain over and over. He is a poet who reaches us in a deeper, more reflective, more personal space. How is one to understand the tortured relationship Bob Dylan has to American protest music? While he was a master in the art of expressing the angst and mood of his generation, he was also reluctant to be crowned as spokesman for that generation. In Dylan, we can see the “tension between individual expression and speaking for a broader movement.”36 Does one supersede or overwhelm the other? Born Robert Allen Zimmerman in 1941 in Minnesota, while a student at the University of Minnesota, he changed his name to Dylan to honor the poet Dylan Thomas whom he admired. In 1961, he moved to New York City and quickly became a fixture in the folk music scene. Dylan’s turn from the pop music of his college days to folk music became, as he said: The thing about rock ‘n’ roll is that for me anyway, it wasn’t enough . . . there were great catch-phrases and driving pulse rhythms . . . but the songs weren’t serious or didn’t reflect life in a realistic way. I know that when I got into folk music, it was more of a serious type of thing. The songs were filled with more

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despair, more sadness, more triumph, more faith in the supernatural, much deeper feelings.37

With albums released in 1962 and 1963, Dylan established himself as both a significant new folk singer, and a composer of influential protest sings. His ’63 album included the now iconic “Blowin’ in the Wind.” New albums followed in 1964, ’65, and ’66. And although each new album reflected a shift in tone and content, they continued to demonstrate Dylan’s “ability to penetrate deeply into the collective American psyche.”38 He became America’s shrink and prophet.39 Dylan soon became the voice of a new generation, and at first, Dylan seemed willing to embrace the responsibility. But even here, Dylan was hesitant to embrace the mantle of protest singer. He preferred to be seen as a singer of topical songs (a difference in semantics or substance?), and he soon openly resisted the responsibility of leading or expressing the voices of a political movement. Dylan, tired of what he called “finger-pointing songs,” started to write “from inside me.” The burden of being a spokesman led Dylan to retreat within himself and write more personal songs (e.g., in “My Back Pages” (1964), Dylan famously wrote “oh, but I was so much older than, I’m younger than that now”).40 In Chronicles, Dylan directly addressed this question: “Protest songs are difficult to write without making them come off as preachy and one-dimensional . . . you have to show people a side of themselves that they didn’t know is there.”41 To Dylan, it was about mining the subconscious, not preaching to the crowd. Dylan “knew he couldn’t survive being a prophet,” believing that “whatever the counterculture was, I’d seen enough of it.”42 His Sinatra-esque “I gotta be me” approach signaled retreat from public life and a retreat inward. But the power of Dylan’s imagery, the accessibility of his lyrics, the emotional release of his messages, touched and influenced his audience. Herbert Marcuse, Marxist scholar and author of One-Dimensional Man,43 noted Dylan’s impact on his times, writing: The traditional language somehow seems to be dead. It seems to be incapable of communicating what is going on today, and archaic and obsolete compared with some of the achievements and force of the artistic and the poetic language, especially in the context of the opposition against this society among the protesting and rebellious youth of our time. When I saw and participated in their demonstration against the war in Vietnam, when I heard them singing the songs of Bob Dylan, I somehow felt, and it is very hard to define, that is really the only revolutionary language left today.

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The traditional concepts and the traditional words used to designate a better society, that is a free society (and art has something to do with freedom), seem to be without any meaning today. They are inadequate to convey what man and things can be and ought to be. These traditional concepts pertain to a language which is still that of a pre-technological and pre-totalitarian era in which we no longer live . . . thus, since the thirties, we see the intensified and methodological search for a new language, for a poetic language as a revolutionary language, for an artistic language as a revolutionary language. This implies the concept of the imagination as a cognitive faculty, capable of transcending and breaking the spell of the establishment.44

In 1963, Dylan prefaced the singing of “Blowing in the Wind” by claiming that “this here ain’t a protest song or anything like that ’cause I don’t write protest songs . . . I’m just writing it as something to be said, for somebody, by somebody.”45 In rejecting the awesome burden of spokesman for a generation, Dylan declared his independence as he distanced himself from the political limelight. Prophet, not leader. And yet, Dylan protesting that he is not a protest singer seems somewhat akin to Herman Melville saying that Moby Dick is just a book about a big fish. Call them what you will, protest or topical songs, the body of work contributed by Bob Dylan is astonishing for the sheer volume of sings, the longevity of his career, and the quality of the music and poetry produced. Dylan’s many folk ballads, love songs, and protest music influenced multiple generations and delved into and exposed the soul of the nation. His poetry (lyrics) spoke to universal needs, fears, hopes, and aspirations. He is our voice and our conscience. Of Dylan’s early politicized songs, the 1963 song “Blowin’ in the Wind,” established him as a poet/prophet of his time. A critique of the nation’s paranoia over nuclear war in a bomb-shelter culture, Dylan uses repetition to call attention to his subject: “How many?” repeated over and over, until he reminded us that: The answer . . . is blowin’ in the wind.

In 1964, Dylan released “The Times They Are A-Changin,’” often called “an anthem for frustrated youth,” as well as a call to action. It opens with a calling: Come gather ’round people Wherever you roam

Then an indictment:

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And admit that the waters around you have grown

This leads to a call to action: And you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone For the times they are a-changin’

He later amplifies his call to action, warning “mothers and fathers” that your children are “beyond you command,” so get out of the way, ’cause the times they are a changin.’ In ’65, Dylan released one of his most enigmatic songs, “Like a Rolling Stone.” A song about the social and political alienation of 1960s youth, Dylan asks “how does it feel . . . to be without a home, like a complete unknown, like a rolling stone?” A precursor of things to come, “Like a Rolling Stone” anticipates the youth rebellion of the late 1960s pointing to the world—the fraud—young Americans were entering into. There is, Dylan warns, trouble ahead. Trouble, indeed. In the nuclear age, Dylan expressed the angst of his generation with such songs as “Masters of War” (1963). An angry Dylan condemns the warmongers: “you ain’t worth the blood that runs in your veins.” And in his classic “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” (1963), he responds to the Cuban missile crisis, when the United States and the Soviet Union played a nuclear game of chicken, threatening a global nuclear war. Although Dylan would later distance himself from the view that the “hard rain” represented nuclear fallout, the lyrics are despondent, even frightening. In answer to “what did you see?” Dylan produces a litany of the morose and depressing: (“I saw guns and sharp sounds in the hands of young children”). And by way of contrast, Dylan’s “With God on Our Side” 1964 tells the story of a boy raised in the Midwest who grew up believing that God was on our side. But as the “cavalries charged,” and the “Indians fell,” the bloody result was the destruction of Native-Americans, but: Oh, the country was young With God on its side

Dylan then does a broad sweep of US history and the many wars when God was on our side. The lyrics are reminiscent of Abraham Lincoln’s haunting message in his second inaugural address, delivered at the end of the Civil War. Lincoln bemoaned the fact that both side in the war had claimed that God was on their side, that their cause was righteous. But Lincoln passed up the opportunity to gloat. Instead, he said of the North and South:

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Both read the same bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes his aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s fares, but let us judge not, that we be not judged.

Dylan, has also addressed the politics of race. His 1962 song “Oxford Town,” written in response to the University of Mississippi’s in reaction to the enrollment of African American James Meredith, reminded listeners that when he went to school: Guns and clubs followed him down All because his face was brown

The next year, he followed up with a song written in reaction to the assignation of civil rights leader Medgar Evans, who was taught in school that “the laws are with him,” but only to protect those with “white skin.” But it ain’t him to blame He’s only a pawn in their game

In 1964, Dylan returned to the themes of violence and racial injustice in “The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll,” a fifty-one-year-old Black woman, was killed by a 24-year-old white male who was from a wealthy family. He was convicted of assault and sentenced to six months in a county jail. Dylan’s melody is taken from a traditional folk song, “Mary Hamilton,” but the lyrics drip with rage: In the courtroom of honor, the judge pounded his gavel To show that all’s equal and that the courts are on the level

In 1979, Dylan returned to the theme of race and politics in “Hurricane,” about the unjust imprisonment of boxer Ruben “Hurricane” Carter. The case became a cause célébre for progressives and Dylan was one of the sparks who brought Carter’s imprisonment to public attention. In Bob Dylan, one can see how the intersection of art and politics can resonate and influence public thought. But Dylan’s occasional artistic as well as political ambivalence allowed him to go only so far. His uncertainty, even humility, came through in the classic 1964 song “My Back Pages,” of a “self-ordained professor who spoke of liberty,” but: “Equality” I spoke the word as if a wedding vow Ah, but I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now

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And in the end, Dylan reminds us (in “Subterranean Homesick Blues” 1963), “don’t follow leaders,” and “the pump didn’t work, cause the vandals took the handles.” MUSIC AND RACE All people, in all circumstances, are drawn to music to express joy, sadness, and love, and to explain as well as give voice to their lives. And from the days of the slave trade to today, African Americans have used music to help reconcile their situation and sing out themes of grief, hope, and a belief in a better tomorrow. Music was a tool of spiritual connection, political mobilization, and emotional outlet. Songs of joy, hymns of glory, anthems to liberation gave an oppressed minority a voice, a means of expression, an outlet.46 But first, we must confront the harsh reality of slavery and oppression. And our starting point should be Billie Holiday’s 1939 recording of Abel Meeropol’s “Strange Fruit,” a riveting song, difficult to listen to because of its focus on lynching, but powerful in its depiction of the horror faced by African Americans. Southern trees bear a strange fruit Blood on the leaves and blood at the root

These trees bear no sustenance, as the fruit is in the person of Black men being lynched. Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees

The strange fruit produces “bulging eyes” and a grotesque result, as the listener is taken from the scent of magnolias to: Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh Then the sudden smell of burning flesh

Billie Holiday’s version, reeking of power and soul, casts us in the crowd as observers, even participants. The song captures more than any report or book ever could. We are taken there. As Holiday became known for singing social message songs about race, her mother asked, “Why are you stretching your neck out?” to which she replied, “Because it might make things better.” Her mother, unconvinced,

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said, “But you’d be dead,” to which Holiday said, “Yeah, but I’ll feel it. I’ll know it in my grave.”47 Soul and R&B music, expressive and compelling, continued—usually in a more commercially viable way—expressing the angst of our oppressed people. Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come” (1964) expressed the hope and belief that in spite of the rampant racism so prevalent in the country, perhaps, a change will come:48 It’s been a long, a long time coming But I know a change gonna come

The civil rights movement of 1960s both led to and was led by the intoxicating power of music. And Nina Simone was at the epicenter of it all. Trained as a classical pianist, Simone started singing merely to pay the bills. But a distinctive style soon emerged, and the power of her convictions—as well as her talents—were laid bare in her music. Introduced to her audiences via her touching rendition of Gershwin’s “I Loves You Porgy,” Simone soon became both a musical star and a civil rights icon. “Mississippi Goddam” was a biting critique of racial oppression. But Simone could also strike up an optimistic note as she did with “To Be Young, Gifted, and Black” (1969). “A Change Is Gonna Come,” along with Nina Simone’s “Mississippi Goddam” (1964), sparked audiences to face up to the reality of racism in

Figure 3.3.  Nina Simone. Philippe Gras. Source: Alamy Stock Photo

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America.49 (See the documentary What Happened, Miss Simone? for an excellent review of Nina Simone’s rise and fall.) Jazz, that uniquely American form of music, was a celebration of both individualism and connection. In stark contrast to a classical orchestra, with the dominant and at times domineering conductor dictating to the musicians, jazz was more free form, more open, more individually creative, more spontaneous. And as one musician rises, others adapt and support; then, after the pianist takes the lead, he or she backs away and the bassist may take center stage. To be successful, each artist must be in tune with the others, play off the others, lead here, follow there. You start with a theme, then riff. To “see” this in action, listen to Keith Jarrett’s “I Loves You Porgy,” or “Be My Love.” It is ironic that jazz, the freest of all musical forms, has its roots in the enslaved and oppressed. Where most music is scripted and standardized, jazz is free and adaptive. Those of us who have been the most free politically seem the least free musically; those whose tradition is slavery and oppression are often the most musically free among us. Reggae music was also a vehicle for expressing political views, especially relating to race. The music of Bob Marley because both popular and highly imitated. James Brown linked soul music to Black power politics. His “Say It Loud—I’m Black and I’m Proud” (1968) made “The Godfather of Soul” an instant voice for rising Black pride in America. It was also Brown’s break from a career controlled by white-led record companies and the emergence of a powerful voice for Black liberation. Rap and hip-hop are the most recent additions to the lexicon of African American–inspired music. In the 1980s, Public Enemy, founded by Chuck O and Flavor Flav, began to introduce audiences to music with a hip-hop beat and strong political sentiments, especially on racism in America. An avalanche of new rap and hip-hop artists then flooded the music scene. Confrontational, unbowed, and “out there,” these artists frontally attacked racism while trying consciously to reflect to audiences, the Black experience in America. It was a modern, updated message, built upon James Brown’s 1968, funk classic “I’m Black and I’m Proud.” One of the first major hip-hop/rap records was Grandmaster’s Flash’s “The Message,” from 1982.50 The song described a neighborhood strewn with broken glass, rats, roaches, bill collectors, cars being repossessed, and a kid who “don’t want to go to school.”51 The song compares the neighborhood to a jungle. This notion of the concrete jungle would inspire future rap artists to describe the plight of downtrodden neighborhoods and oppressed people. Some critics dislike this genre because of its depictions of violence and lyrics that were often misogynistic, but artists like Chuck D of Public Enemy

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argued for its legitimacy. He called rap music the “Black CNN” as it relayed information about inner cities concerns to the masses.52 Rap and hip-hop had an infectious energy, and artists like Tupac Shakur, Kanye West, and Jay-Z brought the music to more mainstream audiences. With the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, hip-hop and rap were ways to spread the word, bring people together, and give expression to the political challenges African Americans faced. Kendrick Lamar’s 2015 album, “To Pimp a Butterfly” was the angst of the age all wrapped into one album. It also earned Lamar a Pulitzer Prize. Reggae music, sometimes referred to as “political manifesto music,” started with a cult following but emerged in the 1970s as a widespread and influential music movement. Political manifesto music: requires the identification of a coherent conceptual focus amidst a generally complex collection of related political ideas, all of which have to be recognizably located within a significant body of music. Thus, a song cannot be considered an example of political manifesto music simply because it has political content. Rather, the artist has to have a coherent set of political views, and the artist needs to address at least the bulk of the complexity inherent in these views in a material part of his or her music.53

The premier reggae artist was Bob Marley. The Jamaican-born artist links his Rastafarian beliefs with his Ska-derived music. His intended audience was the poor and oppressed, but his music held wide appeal. Marley was able to preach as well as teach and used music as his vehicle. Through music, oppressed groups were able to express their truth. This music spoke to wide audiences, both Black and white. The passion, the power, and the politics of such political music allowed the oppressed to tell their story. COUNTRY MUSIC While most artists skew politically to the left, music, and the politics of music, are not monolithic. And while many Donald Trump supporters and conservatives complain (with some justification) about liberal bias in the arts, a wide range of views and a pluralism of opinion is available to citizens. American country music often gives expression to traditional family values and conservative political views. The music of such iconic country artists as Merle Haggard (“Oakie from Muskogee,” 1969), Johnny Cash, and Willie Nelson spoke to an audience that was not big-city, but country-rural. Many in this audience felt left out and put down by liberal cosmopolitans who they

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felt mocked the “fly-over states.” To many of these people, the traditional values (God, guns, and glory) are being threatened by an increasingly secular society, and country music often speaks to their views. Country music is story music. In country music we hear the music of the common person, their trials and travails. And while some highbrow critics demean country music, it speaks to the story of the heartland, of farming communities, of small-town America. There are a few country artists who go against the conservative trend. Keith Urban’s “Female” (2017) deals with the impact of sexism on women; Kacey Musgraves’ “Follow Your Arrow” (2013) calls on listeners to follow who you are; and Carrie Underwood’s “Love Wins” (2018) is a frontal assault on prejudice and hatred. In the song, Underwood sings: I believe you and me are sisters and brothers And I, I believe we’re made to be here for each other

And of course, there is the Dixie Chicks incident where, in the 2000s, they openly criticized President George W. Bush and faced a torrent of criticism as well as personal attacks and threats. In conservative circles, one can only go so far. In recent years, several women country singers have turned their attention to the plight of women in society, telling their stories of victimization and violence against women. Rather than sitting back, they tell these stories frankly and vividly, taking an unflinching look at the mistreatment and abuse of women.54 They tell the stories that previously were hidden, buried, or ignored. In Miranda Lambert’s 2007 song “Gunpowder & Lead,” she tells a story of physical abuse and the fear and anguish of being slapped and shaken “like a rag doll.” But she refuses to accept the role of victims, turning instead to retaliation and revenge, determined to reclaim her power.55 Likewise, Carrie Underwood’s 2005 song, “Before He Cheats,” tells the story of betrayal and revenge.56 These songs by female country artists tell a different story, their story, women’s stories. Silent no more, hidden no more, the stories of women are finally being told. I WANT MY MTV A three-minute story: a music video. Born in the early 1980s, the nascent music video searched for a style or approach that sold the artist and the song to a newfound young cable TV audience. MTV was the first ever television channel dedicated to music videos (and, truth be told, some of the early ones were pretty lame). It took off as a child

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of cable television and served as a promotional vehicle for new music. We ancient mariners who were present at the creation remember “Centerfold” (J. Geils Band, 1981), “Video Killed the Radio Star” (The Buggles, 1979), “You Better Run” (Pat Benatar, 1980), “Brass in Pocket” (The Pretenders, featuring Chrissie Hynde, 1979). Young audiences gravitated towards MTV. It was our station with our music. Take that, Mom and Dad! The early videos showcased artists and songs, and the video “stories” focused not so much on social issues, but on pop music stars. But music has always told stories; it wasn’t long until artists started to use this new access to make more explicit political statements. While music videos were still commercials for new songs, they also began to express political viewpoints. From Michael Jackson’s, “Black or White” (1991) on race relations to U2’s “Sunday Bloody Sunday” (1983) on the “Troubles” in Northern Ireland, to Tupac’s “Keep Ya Head Up” (1993) on sexual politics, music videos became fertile territory for political storytelling. Today, with the benefit of YouTube and other forms of social media, these music videos reach a wider audience. Artists like Childish Gambino (aka Donald Glover) with “This Is America” (2018), Beyonce’s concept album “Lemonade” (2016), MIA’s “Borders” (2018), Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” (2015), and Janelle Monae’s “Pynk” (2018) are able to speak to the political angst of their age. These mini-stories—ideal for an audience reputed to have a short attention span—are bite-sized political dramas designed to have an impact. They are ubiquitous and serve as a venue for political solidarity in a socially connected age. Accessibility. Today, almost any would-be musician can record and upload music. This democratization of music brings artistic freedom and accessibility as never before. CONCLUSION Political expression can take many forms: a speech, a documentary movie, a persuasive manuscript. And political expression is also found in music. Through this form of artistic expression, emotions as well as ideas come into play. We feel, and perhaps we think. For centuries, artists have used music to inspire and motivate, to entertain and enlighten. Given the special nature of music and the senses that it enlivens, it can sometimes seem like politics through the back door. From the Beatles to Sting, Beethoven to U2, Nina Simone to Aaron Copeland, music matters to us. And it may also shape our viewpoints.

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The stories found in music tell our story via song. Songs often give voice to the downtrodden and oppressed. They can also be tools of the powerful. We are drawn to music, to the beat, the themes, the rhymes, and cadences. And at times we are drawn to the political message. The stories in songs may tap into memories of lost love or unrequited love. They may also inspire us to “fight the system.” Touching us in a way far different from paintings, books, or speeches, they nonetheless portray the politics as well as the angst of their times. NOTES 1. David Remnick. “Let the Record Show.” The New Yorker, October 18, 2021, p. 43. 2. Courtney Brown, Politics in Music: Music and Political Transformation from Beethoven to Hip-Hop (Farsight Press, 2008); and Stuart Isacoff, Musical Revolutions (Knopf, 2022). 3. Street, John. “Fight the Power”: The Politics of Music and the Music of Politics, Government and Opposition (2003), 113–30. 4. Matteo Ravasio, “History of Western Philosophy of Music: Antiquity to 1800,” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Fall 2021, Section 1.3, https:​ //​ plato​ .stanford​/edu​/entries​/histwestphilmusic​-to​-1800​/​#MusiEmotSociPlatAris 5. Leo Tolstoy, What Is Art? (Penguin Classics, 1996), written in 1897. 6. Plato, Republic in Greek and Roman Aesthetics, ed. and trans. Oleg V. Bychkov and Anne Sheppard (Cambridge, 2010), 47–48 7. Republic, Book IV, 424. 8. Jon Meacham and Tim McGraw, Songs of America: Patriotism, Protest, and the Music That Made a Nation (Random House, 2019), 4. 9. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Musique,” in Euvres Completes Diet Onaire de Musique (Paris: Galliamard—Biblioteque de la Pleaide, 1994), 922. 10. John Street, Music and Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2013), 144. 11. Street, 148. 12. Daniel Levitin, This Is Your Brain on Music (Penguin, 2006). 13. See: Robert Gourdain, Music, the Brain, and Ecstasy: How Music Captures Our Imagination (Harper Perennial, 1997). 14. Craig Werner, We Gotta Get Out of This Place: The Soundtrack of the Vietnam War (University of Massachusetts Press, 2015). 15. Robert Rosenthal and Richard Flacks, Playing for Change: Music and Musicians in the Service of Social Movements (2012). 16. See: Alex Ross, Wagnerism: Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music (Picador, 2021). 17. Jacques Attali, Noise: The Political Economy of Music (University of Minnesota Press, 1985).

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18. See: Frida Knight, Beethoven and the Age of Revolution. (New York: International Publishers, 1973); and David Be. Dennis, Beethoven in German Politics, 1870–1989 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1996). 19. Alex Ross, Wagnerism: Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2020). 20. John Bokina, Opera and Politics (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997). 21. Hugo Frey, ed. Songs for America (New York: Robbins Music Corporation, 1941). 22. Friedrich Hecker, “Das Politische Lied” [The Political Song] 1848, preface to Karl Heinrich Schnauffer, Neue Lieder fur das Teutsche Volk (Rheinfelden, 1848). 23. Ian MacDonald, Revolution in the Head: The Beatles’ Records and the Sixties, 3rd ed. (Chicago Review Press, 2005), 1. 24. Allan Bloom, The Closing of the American Mind (Simon & Schuster, 1987). 25. MacDonald, 13. 26. Quoted in MacDonald, 2. 27. Michael Baur and Steven Baur, The Beatles and Philosophy: Nothing You Can Think That Can’t Be Thunk (Open Court, 2006), 104–5. 28. Jann S. Wenner, Lennon Remembers (Verso Books, 2001), 11–12. 29. George Case, Takin’ Care of Business: A History of Working People’s Rock n’ Roll (Oxford University Press, 2021). 30. Dorian Lynskey, 33 Revolutions per Minute: A History of Protest Songs, From Billie Holiday to Green Day (ECCO, 2011). 31. Lynskey, 33 Revolutions per Minute, 15. 32. Daniel Wolff, Grown Up Anger: The Connected Mysteries of Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie and the Calumet Massacre of 1913 (Harper, 2017). 33. George Lipsits, “Who’ll Stop the Rain? Youth Culture, Rock ‘n’ Roll, and Social Crises,” in David Farber, ed., The Sixties: From Memory to History (1994), 211. 34. See: Todd Gitlin, The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage (Bantam, 1993). 35. John Mauceri, The War on Music: Reclaiming the Twentieth Century (Yale University Press, 2022). 36. James Garratt, Music and Politics: A Critical Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 2019), 135. 37. Biograph, 1985, liner notes, text, Cameron Crowe. 38. Garratt, op. at., 152. 39. Garratt, op. at., 153. 40. Nat Hentoff, “Crackin,’ Shakin,’ Breakin’ Sounds,” The New Yorker, October 24, 1964, reprinted in The New Yorker, August 29, 2022, p. 50. 41. Bob Dylan. Chronicles (Simon and Schuster, 2005), 55. 42. David Remnick, “Restless Farewell,” The New Yorker, October 31, 2022, p. 17. 43. Herbert Marcuse. One Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society (Beacon Press, 1991), first published in 1964. 44. Herbert Marcuse. “Art in the One-Dimensional Society,” in Collected Papers, vol. IV, 1967, 113–51. 45. Quoted in Garratt, 136.

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46. Daphne A. Brooks, Liner Notes for the Revolution: The Intellectual Life of Black Feminist Sound (Belknap, 2023). 47. Quoted in: Dorian Lynskey, 33 Revolutions per Minute (ECCO, 2011), 13. 48. Craig Werner, A Change Is Gonna Come: Music Race and Soul in America (University of Michigan Press, 2006). 49. Traci N. Todd, Nina: A Story of Nina Simone (Putnam, 2021). 50. Dick Weissman, Talkin’ Bout a Revolution (Backbeat, 2010), 110. 51. Ibid, 111. 52. Ibid, 112. 53. Timothy White, Catch a Fire: The Life of Bob Marley (Henry Holt, 1983), see also Courtney Brown, The Politics of Music (2008), 29. 54. See: Jewel Wicker, “Man Down: Who Is Afforded the Right to Sing about Revenge?” Oxford American, January 29, 2023. 55. A similar theme can be seen in the Marvel Comic television series Jessica Jones. 56. See: Rihanna’s 2011 single “Man Down.”

Chapter Four

On Movies and Politics Political Storytelling through Films

The movie industry is a storytelling business. We love movies because we love stories. Movies are a modern art form, and over time, the industry grew in audience, technological innovations, and special effects. But the movie business of today bears little resemblance to the early decades of the industry. Today, filmmaking is mythmaking, and the movie business is a mega-business. There was a time—the pre-blockbuster era—when movies were often discussed as an art form. Today, they are recognized primarily as business. Their chief goal is to generate profits for their producers and investors. To do so, they must draw an audience. The market for “highbrow” or art films is limited. Thus, as the profit motive is the prime mover in the industry, the bigger the audience, the better. This sometimes means appealing to the lowest common denominator, or dumbing down the product. And yet, in seeking an audience, there is still room—even in today’s blockbuster format—for films to inform, teach, educate, and uplift. Those who make films—writers, actors, directors, and producers—are no doubt influenced by the political context of their times. But do they also serve as society’s influencers? Most movies have a narrative form (tell a story) or a least an implicit message they are trying to convey. Some films, and this has become increasingly the case over the past few decades, have an explicit political message to deliver. No one doubts that Leni Riefenstahl’s documentary The Triumph of the Will (1935) was deliberately crafted to mobilize political allegiance for Adolph Hitler’s regime. Does that make her film “art” or a mere servant to monstrosity? The rise of film in America and around the world has been phenomenal.1 Movies develop many themes: views of life and society, politics and people, power and impotence, dominance and submission, gender and race, 91

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revolution, and stability. The in-theater audience (a shrinking demographic) enters the theater voluntarily (pays to get in), willingly sits in darkness and near silence, and waits attentively hoping and expecting to be enthralled and entertained. But more than entertainment occurs. The audience is exposed to social and political ideas, and these ideas will—to a degree—influence the audience. Thus, it is important to view film from a political perspective as well as viewing film as art, entertainment, storytelling, or business. As the audience, we may unwittingly fall victim to the social and political influences contained in movies and television. We are being influenced, perhaps propagandized often without really being aware of what is happening to us. We go to a theater or watch our televisions or screens and “willingly suspend disbelief.” We want to be taken away. As famed producer Darryl Zanuck said, “If you have something worthwhile to say, dress it in the glittering robes of entertainment and you will find a ready market.”2 The goal of this chapter is to make more explicit the often implicit political stories contained in films and to discuss why and how “storytelling” through film is so important to us. We believe that one can better understand politics and government by better understanding movies. Since many films contain political messages, it is important to be aware of when and how movies seek to influence our thinking. Rather than falling victim to these messages, we can, if we are aware of their presence, become the masters of our own intellectual fates. Since movies are an important part of the lives of so many of us, it is incumbent upon us to move beyond the entertainment value of films and see the social and political forces at work. Studies on the media generally, and films specifically, have risen precipitously in the past few decades as we have recognized the impact of the media on our lives. “Visual literacy,”3 the interpretation of visual and verbal symbols as presented through the media, is one of the most important tools one can possess in the modern “media-ized” and social-media-infused world. The movement toward the recognition and development of visual literacy began with Marshall McLuhan and the publication of his book Understanding Media (1964). McLuhan argued that the new visual medium would bring about a new consciousness which would pit the old linear logic (print) against the new media (visual). We are all part of the visual generation, weaned on a visual language of film, television, and screens. Since the visual media will continue to be so pervasive, we must learn how to deal intelligently with it. People who cannot cope with the media, who do not develop their critical viewing skills, will be under severe handicaps in the coming years. Filmmaking is a relatively recent form of storytelling. Long before Frank Capra, Martin Scorsese, Clint Eastwood, Spike Lee, and Michael Moore— Aristophanes, Sophocles, Shakespeare, Henrik Ibsen, and George Bernard

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Shaw were writing about leadership, politics, power, the abuse of the public trust, human rights, and community-based decision-making. Plays, movies, and art matter. They help us understand the human condition and the challenge of trying to get along in a complex world. POLITICAL STORIES There is, of course, some truth to the proverb cited above. Primarily, movies are in the business of entertainment. But, of course, they are much more. The movie theater is for more than dreaming; it is also for learning. However hard the movie moguls may try, they cannot escape the fact that films contain messages, oftentimes disturbing or thought-provoking messages. Most of the major themes of politics are treated in American movies. There are some notable limits, but this chapter explains how movies can tell a political story and educate us about the political values and challenges we face and the stories we need to tell and need to hear. We need to remember that filmmakers embellish and distort certain events to make their narratives work. They do this in part to sell tickets (and popcorn), but they do it also in an effort to reduce their stories to limited time constraints of roughly ninety minutes. Thus, they take liberties and shortcuts and employ literary license to tell their stories. It is a challenge to make films about politics because issues are often complicated, and it is impossible to avoid oversimplification in films. Also, audiences have not often been that interested in the intricate operations of political institutions.4 Our vernacular is littered with words and phrases drawn from films and pop culture. “Play it again, Sam,” from Casablanca, words that were not actually said in the movie, “I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse,” from The Godfather; “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,” from Gone with the Wind; “Toto, I’ve got a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore,” from The Wizard of Oz; “Go ahead, make my day,” from Sudden Impact; “You talkin’ to me?,” from Taxi Driver; “Rosebud,” from Citizen Kane; “Show me the money,” from Jerry Maguire; “You can’t handle the truth,” from A Few Good Men; “Round up the usual suspects,” from Casablanca; “I’ll be back,” from Terminator; “I’m the king of the world,” from Titanic; all are catch-phrases we often use and hear. They are a part of our everyday vocabulary. Films also set up frames of reference, stories, or context. We sometimes judge politics in reference to what we see in movies and the expectations they set up. For example, movies often portray politicians as venal, corrupt, and petty. This reinforces views that already abound in the land. Are our cynical views of politicians reinforced by movies and television?

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Likewise, we live in a world where we are bombarded with star power and celebrity. We want to know the gossip about our film stars. Who are they dating? What marriage is on the rocks? Who is sleeping with whom? Who cheated on who, with whom? These superficial concerns entertain, titillate, and distract us. We focus on the trivial—entertain ourselves to death—while our leaders often continue to exercise power in darkness.5 Films do something to us. We are affected by them. They amuse us, shape us, entertain us, and influence us. They are tools of socialization. But if we enter the theater blind to the power films have over us, we can become their victims. This chapter seeks to make more explicit some of the political influences at work in films. If you the viewer are more aware of the political messages contained in films, you can be more discriminating in the ideas and messages you choose to accept or reject. Society has many agents of socialization: family, church, school, and so on. The media is an increasingly important socializing agent. Through the media we, in part, learn who we are, how we are supposed to behave, what we are supposed to think; in short, we learn proper forms of behavior in society. From the original James Bond movies, we learn how to be suave. From Star Wars, we learn parables of power and justice; we learn of family roles, relations, and moral codes. From Dirty Harry, we learn how to take the law into our hand. From Titanic we learn of the power of young love. Film serves as one of society’s most powerful sources of role models, and its ability to socialize is powerful. As Hollywood producer Cecil B. de Mille said somewhat sarcastically in 1935: “So the Mickey Mousians of today will be the New Dealers of tomorrow, whereas the Popeyesians will breed a race of fascists.”6 Films that are most popular have the widest potential for influence. The more we see one form of behavior glorified on the screen (e.g., war and violence, or peace and brotherhood), the more apt we are (consciously or subconsciously) to embrace and emulate it.7 Constantly presented images and role models cannot help but influence us. Be it John Wayne or the Fonz, Rambo or Luke Skywalker, President Bartlet or Frances Underwood, Wonder Woman or Lord Voldemort, Okoge or Hannibal Lecter, Indiana Jones or Darth Vader, we become—in part—what we see. Even the movies considered as “escapist” or “fantasy” films contain powerful social messages. Star Wars (1977) was an immensely popular film (as were many of its sequels and prequels) which celebrated simple (even simplistic) values by creating a wholesome fantasy which, in the words of film critic Charles Champlin, “sweeps away the cynicism that has in recent years obscured the concepts of valor, dedication, and honor.”8 In the aftermath of Vietnam and Watergate in the 1970s, the public seemed to be searching for a morality play which simplified the conflict between

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good and the evil. The moral climate of Star Wars was, to director George Lucas, an attempt to provide young audiences with “a moral anchor” and to give a “psychological tool that children can use to understand the world better and their place in it and how to adjust to that.”9 Star Wars was a fantasy in the old-time-western cowboy good-guy/bad-guy tradition. And like its western forefathers, Star Wars was a lesson in morality. It was not merely the simple, innocent fantasy some made it out to be. This film drew an enormous audience, which was being influenced by moral principles in fairy tale clothes. On the surface, Star Wars was fantasy, but it was also persuasion. It gave us clues as to how to behave and what to think. In exploring the relationship between art, film, and politics, we must first ask, “what is a ‘political’ film?” In a very real sense, all films are political. They all tell stories with political implications. All movies present social and/ or political views and positions either implicitly or explicitly. Portrayals of life, relations, good and bad all have important political implications. But to say that all films are political take us no further in our understanding of the political impact of movies.10 Critic Dwight MacDonald writes that for a film to be political, it must be a “vehicle for international propaganda or with the intention of bringing about political change.”11 This definition is useful on two levels. First a “vehicle for international propaganda” includes such explicitly political films as Nazi Germany’s Triumph of the Will (1935), the Soviet Union’s The Battleship Potemkin (1925), and the United States’s I Was a Communist for the FBI (1951).12 The second part of MacDonald’s definition, films with the “intention of bringing about political change,” is also useful for the less explicit forms of political film. This category would be much larger than the first and includes some films perhaps not ordinarily viewed as political. If we view the second part of MacDonald’s definition broadly, bringing about political change need not mean simply changing a particular law, or supporting a particular candidate or cause. For our purposes, this should mean presenting a particular social, political, or economic arrangement. Thus defined, movies such as It’s a Wonderful Life (1946), Citizen Kane (1940), and Dr. Strangelove (1964) all have important political overtones, as do more contemporary series such as Game of Thrones (2011–2019). We might, however, add a third element to make MacDonald’s definition more complete: “films designed to affect or support the status quo.” Due to the economic factors involved in making films as well as political considerations, most films support and glorify the status quo. In terms of the political and economic system, moral climate, social relationships, and so on, most films glorify “what is” at the expense of “what might be” or “what ought to

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be.” Not wanting to bite the hand that feeds it, can we really expect many films to come out squarely against capitalism or in direct opposition to the United States? To understand the political role of films, we must also look at them in relation to their audience. The political film, while seeking to entertain, may also attempt to do other things: to get the viewer to think, act, or change. But to be effective, the moviemaker must never lose sight of the audience. Every viewer brings intellectual/political/cultural prejudices to the viewing of films. As director Constantin Costa-Gavras once said: “A movie is like a Spanish inn—you can eat only what you bring with you. Each member of an audience sees a movie with the culture, information, and the character he has.”13 This has caused some controversy between those who feel that a political film must be “intellectually pure” and those who stress the commercial role of films. These differences can be seen when we contrast the views of George Bernard Shaw and Bertolt Brecht. Shaw felt that if you wanted the audience to swallow your political view, you had to “sugar-coat the pill . . . provide an audience with enough of the pleasures they were used to getting from the dramatic experience so that they would be open to the play of ideas as well.”14 Contrast this view with Brecht’s opinion that it is “paramount not to involve the audience but to separate it from the experience (the so-called Verfremdungs-Effekt) . . . not to win over an audience by propaganda (which uses all the forces of the medium to manipulate viewers) but on the contrary to set up the dialectic of a political situation, objectively, on the theory that then the attraction of the logic would involve the audience intellectually rather than emotionally.”15 The truth probably rests somewhere between these two views. Shaw’s sugarcoating is, in part, necessary because for a political film to spread its message, it must attract a wide audience. Conversely, if the message itself is so muted by the demands of excitement and entertainment and the essential message watered down, then the film loses much of its social and political impact. The truly successful political film often marches a middle ground between entertainment and intellect, between the sugar-coating required to get the audience into the theater and the dialectic process required to convey a message. A filmmaker like Frank Capra might fit into Shaw’s “sugar-coating” category (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, Meet John Doe), while German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder (Berlin Alexanderplatz, Satan’s Brew, Despair) might fit into Brecht’s model. But can either style of political film “teach”? Teaching and learning require time, thought, attention, whereas films may not be able to offer these things. Films are best at portraying human relations and emotions but are weak at deeply exploring ideas.

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Movies capture more than just the entertainment tastes of the public. Movies go below the surface realities and tap parts of the national character that may not seem obvious on first inspection. Primarily, political films tend to support the powers that be. Very few political films call for the overthrow of governments or the radical revision of society. The enormous cost of making, distributing, and publicizing films makes radical content unlikely. Why would the wealthy finance the making of films designed to overthrow the system which protects their wealth? Occasionally, however, a film answers both the demands of the movie industry for “profit” and the requirements of subversion. While such efforts are infrequent, they must nonetheless be explored, and their consequences examined. Such films may take very subtle forms. Manipulation by a skilled director may go unnoticed, but its power is enthralling. Finally, what role should film play in society? Should it be entertainment? Art? Political expression? Should it pander to our basest desires or attempt to enlighten and elevate us? Perhaps these questions are best approached by looking at a problem posed by Alexis de Tocqueville over 180 years ago in his classic work Democracy in America: how do you educate a democracy to appreciate aristocratic values? Or, to modernize it, can film—in a broad or mass society—both entertain and enlighten? To help us understand the role movies play in our lives, and how they convey political messages, we will examine how a variety of political films tell the story of politics in various categories. These categories, though not exhaustive, are designed to give the reader a broad sense of how movies are linked to politics. DEMOCRACY The United States is not a democracy, it is a republic, guided by a constitution and governed by the rule of law. Over time, we became more and more democratic, allowing former slaves to vote in the post–Civil War era (legally if not operationally), women and Native Americans to vote in the 1920s, and eighteen-year-olds in the 1970s. This gradual expansion of the franchise made our republic more responsive to democratic demands and set up the paradox which we are today: the United States is a republic and a democracy. In America, “we the people” rule, directly or indirectly, via democratic or republican means. A paradox, to be sure. “We the people.” The words take on an almost a sacred connotation. They express both an assignment of sovereignty and an aspiration for democracy.

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They place the people at the very center of the American experiment in governing. But just who are “the people”? And how do they (we) rule? In general, the American political film tends to be absolutist (good guys vs. bad guys), simplistic (goodness conquers all), and superpatriotic (whatever our problems, our political system is fundamentally good). And with the rise of superhero comic movies, as was also the case with the classic Western movies, increasingly we receive the message that political activism doesn’t amount to much. We should wait for a hero, a knight in shining armor or a flowing cape to come to our rescue. To illustrate this, let us look at how the American film community responded to one of the most cataclysmic social upheavals of the twentieth century: the economic depression of 1929. This will tell us a great deal about what Hollywood films teach (and preach) about democracy. In the midst of a severe economic depression which threw millions into the unemployment lines and brought despair to Americans, one might have expected the film industry to respond by producing films which spoke to the social and political needs of the times. But did Hollywood produce films which seriously dealt with the Depression’s social, economic, and political conditions and the alternatives to the economic system? Did Hollywood serve as a source of ideas in troubled times? No. How did the movie industry respond to the social and economic crisis of the Depression of 1929? For the most part, it responded by pretending that the Depression did not exist. If one were to look at the films of the 1930s, one would hardly know that the nation was facing a severe economic crisis. Rather than face the issue of economic depression squarely, the films of the 1930s acted as if the Depression hardly existed at all—one might call it “ostrich cinema.” As film critic Andrew Bergman wrote: What happens in depression movies is that traditional beliefs in the possibilities of individual success are kept alive in the early thirties under various guises, that scapegoats for social dislocation are found and that federal benevolence becomes an implicit and ultimately dead-ended premise by the end of the decade. Hollywood would help the nation’s fundamental institutions escape unscathed by attempting to keep alive the myth and wonderful fantasy of a mobile and classless society, by focusing on the endless and possibilities for individual success, by turning social evil into personal evil and making the New Deal into a veritable leading man.16

In response to the critics who suggested that the movies had forsaken their social responsibility by avoiding controversial films dealing with the Depression, Hollywood’s answer was Sullivan’s Travels (1942). Written and directed by Preston Sturges, the film deals with a successful film director

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who is dissatisfied because all he makes are inane comedies like Ants in Your Pants of 1941. He wants to make more realistic movies that deal with the pain and suffering that he sees around him. He wants art to speak to, of, and for the people. Sullivan (Joel McCrea) decides to make an indictment of poverty in the form of a social problem film which he plans to call Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? To do research for the film, Sullivan dresses like a hobo and goes out on the road. In the course of his travels, Sullivan is arrested and sent to prison. While in prison, he and the other prisoners are shown a movie, a silly comedy, and Sullivan realizes, as he watches his fellow prisoners laughing at the film, that during troubled times, people don’t want serious social criticism; they want to escape. He hears at a distance roaring laughter as an audience watches a silly comedy movie. Now, he “knows” that he must go back to Hollywood and make movies that help the common man escape from their troubles. Thus, Hollywood’s answer to its critics: the people don’t need and don’t want “message” pictures; they hunger for escape and entertainment. The public, this movie leads us to believe, would rather have Ants in Their Pants than ideas in their heads. Sullivan’s Travels can serve as Hollywood’s response to the critics who charged the industry with ignoring its social responsibility during the Depression. Hollywood was saying that it wasn’t making social message films because the public simply didn’t want to think. Escapism, not social reality, was the order of the day in the movies of the 1930s. During the Depression decade, more films were made than in any other decade. And the primary role of the movie in this period was that of building morale. While most films offered the public escape, a few films did attempt to deal with Depression-era problems more realistically. Dead End (1937), The Plow That Broke the Plains (1936), and Our Daily Bread (1934) all tried to face depression problems faithfully. Our Daily Bread, directed by King Vidor, shows a husband, who lost his job, and his wife who acquire the rights to an abandoned farm. Knowing nothing about farming, but full of hope, they attempt to make a go of it, only to find that life on the farm is more difficult than they realized. A Swede and his family stop in front of the farm, and before long, the farm is opened to the Swedes, along with other families. They form a cooperative community. When all of the farm’s inhabitants gather to set up some sort of organization they ask, “Do we need a government?” A democracy? “No” is the answer—“that’s what got us into this mess.” Socialism? “No.” they shout. Then, one of the farmers shouts, what we need is a “Big Boss.” Is this a reference to Franklin Roosevelt? Perhaps. To Hitler? Possibly.

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As the subject matter might suggest, Vidor had a difficult time getting financing to have this film made. The major studios refused to back it, and it was not until Vidor got the help of Charlie Chaplin that he was able to finance the film. When the film was released, it met with harsh criticism. The influential Hearst newspapers called it “pinko,” and the Los Angeles Times refused to give the film advertising space. Was Our Daily Bread a subversive, “pinko” film? Subversive it may have been, for it showed an alternative to the status quo, a kind of Jeffersonian agrarian society. Pinko, it was not. In fact, it was, like most other films, nearly devoid of philosophical underpinnings. But it also hinted at an authoritarian brand of leadership. Like Capra, King Vidor was concerned with people, with the “goodness” that could save mankind. Even at its most radical, American political films are still largely pro-American! Because of the upheaval of the Depression, the glue that normally binds our society together began to lose its adhesive quality. People searching for a way out of the misery caused by the economic collapse began to embrace political views were more extremist than normal. Movements of the extreme left (socialism) and of the extreme right (fascism) began to gain followers. Would there be a revolution of the left? A dictator from the right? Or could democracy survive? When World War II came, Hollywood answered the call, and in the anti-communist days of the Cold War, they produced patriotic, pro-democracy movies touting the benefits of “our way of life.” Such movies tended to be simplistic and one-dimensional. Frank Capra’s World War II Why We Fight series, and the Cold War’s I Was a Community for the FBI were more propaganda than persuasive efforts, designed to serve the interests of the war effort. But in non-wartime films, democracy and “the people” fare less well. In the 1957 film A Face in the Crowd, drifter Larry “Lonesome” Rhodes is discovered for his homespun style and everyman charm and is made into a national television celebrity. Rhodes continues to grow in popularity and influence, and his ability to “sell” a sponsor’s products leads to his employ by presidential hopeful Senator Worthington Fuller of California. Rhodes can sell the public on Fuller. He is a snake-oil salesman who can fool and manipulate the public. They fall for his homespun personality and men-of-the-people style. This power begins to go to Rhodes’s head, and he becomes an egomaniac and bully. Things begin to sour in Rhodes’s personal life, and the downturn threatens to bleed into his public persona. Rhodes’s plans to deliver a major address are upended when former associates threaten to reveal the dark truth behind the fraud that is the Rhodes persona. He has a personal as well as public fall and his hopes are shattered. In the end, he is left alone to face an uncertain future.

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A Face in the Crowd treats “the crowd” (the people) as mindless sheep, easily manipulated by an entertaining charlatan. Easily led astray, the people—as was the case in Sullivan’s Travels—merely want to be entertained. Being There (1979) is about a man-child who was raised in isolation behind the high walls of a Washington, DC, mansion. He is kept away from the outside world—presumably because of a learning disability—and his only real contact with the world beyond the mansion walls comes from watching television, to which he seems addicted. He spends his days caring for the gardens on the grounds and watching television. He understands and interprets the world through the lens of television, and when “the old man” dies, he is cast out of the mansion with virtually no skills and thrown into a world that he does not understand. Through a series of accidents, he ends up being welcomed into the home of Washington DC, business mogul Ben Rand (Melvyn Douglas), who has the ear of the president. But who is this strange, simple-minded figure? He is Chance (or Chauncy) the gardener (Peter Sellers). He becomes something of a minor celebrity, and when he is interviewed on television, he dispenses gardening advice that is misinterpreted as a metaphor for the state of the nation’s economy. His celebrity status rises, and his advice is sought by the rich and famous, including the beleaguered president. Chance’s benefactor dies, but his dying wish is for Chance to take care of his wife when he passes. One evening she (Shirley MacLaine) makes sexual advances to Chance, but he is oblivious to the intent, and instead turns on the television and says “I like to watch.” At Ben’s funeral, a group of DC elites conspiratorially discuss their disappointment in the incumbent president and wonder if Chauncey might be a good replacement? Chauncey wanders off, oblivious to the scheme, and walks to a pond where he walks upon the water . . . the end. Chance is America’s everyman, the common man “educated” by watching television. We like to watch, but don’t want to participate. Chance is a fool, but the fool has fooled the sophisticated elites. Being There is an indictment of democracy and elitism, of the common man and the wealthy. How can one have a democracy if the people are so lame? But if the elites too are lame, is there any hope for the future? ELECTIONS Elections are the grand spectacle of democracy. We join together as a nation and determine who among us shall serve our interests in positions of government. Right?

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Telling the stories of elections allows movies to explore some of the most fundamental questions about politics: who shall govern, how does one appeal to the people for support, what strategies and tactics work, and how does the competition of candidates, parties, and ideas play out in a complex society? Based on the 1996 best-selling book by “Anonymous” (later revealed to be journalist Joe Klein), Primary Colors (1998) follows the challenges and controversies of the 1992 presidential primary race with a not-so-hidden parallel to the Bill Clinton campaign. In the movie, we follow Jack Stanton, southern governor and presidential candidate, as he attempts to win his party’s nomination for president. But Stanton (John Travolta) has a problem: he has a weakness for women with big hair and short skirts. The film opens with young political consultant Henry Burton, whom the Stanton campaign is trying to recruit, observing the “Stanton method” in action. Burton sees the candidate working the crowd, shaking hands, making eye contact with the voters, schmoozing. Stanton is a master at working the crowd. He oozes charm. He is a master politician with a progressive agenda. Burton is soon sucked into the Stanton vortex. Things quickly turn sour. Stanton, the incessant womanizer, is accused of having a long-term affair with his wife’s hairdresser, Cashmere McLeod. As the New Hampshire primary approaches, Stanton seems dead in the water. And yet, he fights on. And somehow, he limps toward the nomination. Stanton is a sweet-talking seducer of both women and voters, a person of massive contradictions who cares deeply about helping the average citizen, yet can be opportunistic and ruthless, and a man who cares passionately for reform yet is self-destructive. He is utterly exasperating to friend and foe alike, yet he is able to disarm even some of his toughest critics. A man with insatiable appetites, he seems always to have doughnut crumbs on his suit jacket and a big-haired woman in his sights. His empathy is genuine, as is his idealism. Stanton fends off crisis after crisis—most self-induced. He is a rascal who deeply cares about people and issues yet cynically manipulates those who come into his luminous orbit. His wife, Susan (Emma Thompson), a Hillary Clinton–like character, must deal not just with a philandering husband but with a political campaign about to be derailed by Jack’s extracurricular activities. And yet, she, like her husband, really believes. She sees the good they can do for people—if only they can get elected. She alternately chews him out and saves him. If Jack exasperates her, she is also loyal both to him and to their political ideals. Both Jack and Susan are painfully ambitious, but it is personal ambition mixed with the sincere belief that they can do good things. Primary Colors is unusual in that it presents the political process not in black-and-white terms but in shades of gray. We are all human, with strengths

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and weaknesses. We must make tough choices in a complex world. Stanton is deeply human and deeply flawed. And yet, he has many positive qualities and is a gifted politician. Politics is a rough, tough, unsentimental, and often bruising business. It is compelling and repelling. It takes a tough-minded, thick-skinned person to navigate the choppy waters of a presidential campaign, and if Jack Stanton has his flaws, we all do. Real-world politics is not about achieving sainthood;, it about gaining and using power wisely and well. Can a flawed man be a good president? All our heroes have feet of clay. In the real world, the search for perfection leads inevitably to disappointment. At its best, Primary Colors reveals the moral complexity and ambiguity of politics. It raises tough ethical questions we would rather avoid. Do the ends justify the means? Is there a distinction between one’s private and public morality? Could a truly moral person survive and rise in our brutal political system? Can a flawed person be a good public servant? These issues come to a head late in the film when the primary race finally boils down to two candidates. The Stanton campaign digs up damaging information about its opponent, Governor Fred Picker. What to do? They have the nomination in their grasp, yet it requires a descent into the gutter to release it. Some argue against releasing the information, but Stanton argues that if they don’t release it, their opponents in the general election will, assuring the opposing party the presidency. Better, he argues, to get it out now. Primary Colors asks us, as it asks the characters in the film, to confront tough moral and political choices. It does not sugarcoat this dilemma. Who do we want as leaders? Who can go through this process and not cross moral boundaries? Does the process corrupt? Can a flawed person produce good, moral policies? In Primary Colors we get an inside look at politics, and it isn’t always pretty. But then, we are not always pretty. We cut corners, engage in all sorts of self-satisfying and self-serving behavior, assume the worst in others as we assume the best in ourselves. Primary Colors presents to us a leadership context that is unsettling yet relevant. It is a story of hope and pain, illusions and delusions, human flaws and human aspirations, highs and lows, image and reality. It places the leader in context, stripped of the glitz and glitter of campaign rhetoric and staged events. Our leaders occupy a morally ambiguous world. Few of us can be a Gandhi and succeed. Bob Roberts (1992) is a biting satire of modern campaigning wherein, like A Face in the Crowd, a country music–playing populist begins to draw crowds and political interest based on his “homespun truths” and easily accessible style. He draws people in with music-with-a-message. Bob appeals to working class concerns and the hard feelings of America’s forgotten “little man.”

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Bob’s (Tim Robbins) plan is to convert his populist appeal into a US Senate seat. Bob is also a successful businessman and uses his financial resources to finance his bid. He is running against tired, old incumbent Democrat Brickley Paiste (Gore Vidal) who oozes old money and elite contempt for the common man. The film, seen through eyes of a British film crew who are following the race, shows Roberts travel across the state, singing songs about welfare cheats, drug users, and left wingers. But his campaign lags behind, and it is not until a manufactured sex scandal concerning Paiste and an underage girl emerges, sinking his campaign, that Roberts hurtles toward victory. But Bob Roberts has a few skeletons of his own in the closet, and when independent journalist Bugs Raplin begins to uncover a particularly damaging set of evidence against Roberts, things begin to look bad for Roberts. His campaign is saved when Roberts is seemingly shot by a would-be assassin— Raplin—and Roberts is rushed to the hospital. The incident breathes new life into the Roberts campaign and aided by a sympathy vote, Roberts wins. But as supporters gather outside his hospital, we see what appears to be a silhouette of Roberts walking past the window. Is that Roberts? Upon leaving the hospital, we see Roberts being wheeled out in a wheelchair, the assassination attempt leaving him paralyzed from the waist down. But at a campaign victory party we get a glimpse of Roberts—wheelchair bound—tapping his feet to a song. Bob Roberts presents politics as cynical, campaigns as corrupt and fraudulent, and voters as easily manipulated fools. It is a game where the rules seem to matter little. Winning is the only thing, and if truths must be bent and campaigns must descend into rank manipulation, well, so be it. Overall, movies about campaigning, from The Candidate (1972) to The Ides of March (2011), to Bulworth (1998), to The Front Runner (2018), to Election (1999), present elections and politics primarily as corrupt games, unseemly spectaculars that are dirty and only about winning (at all costs). No wonder so many citizens are unenthusiastic about voting. POWER Power, it is sometimes said, is the currency of politics. That is a narrow view, as politics is, yes, about power, but it is also about group mobilization, the articulation of and pursuit of a common vision or set of goals. It is how we (hopefully) learn to work together to achieve common goals, and it can also be about purpose.

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In the United States, questions not only of who shall exercise power but just what the source of power is, how it is acquired and used, and who benefits have been a source of controversy and conflict. The people or the elites? Money or justice? The law or force? One of the most compelling stories of shifting power in the United States is John Ford’s 1962 classic western, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, starring John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart. Ford directed such great westerns as The Searchers (1956), My Darling Clementine (1946), Stagecoach (1939), and Fort Apache (1948). He was a political conservative who saw the world through a hierarchy of influence and entitlement. Critic John Baxter describes Ford’s viewpoint as: We live. . . . in a stratified moral and social structure, exercising rightful control over those below and doing a respect to those above that becomes adoration in the case of the truly great.17

Ford saw a natural and immutable order or hierarchy in life. His films dealt with the rules and responsibilities and means of establishing order in a chaotic world. The old West was his canvas, and to Ford, the West is a world of Thomas Hobbes, where social Darwinism and manifest destiny come to life. There is no equality in Ford’s world, only the strong and the meek. In his worship of the hero, Ford shows how strong men rule, as well as why they should rule. The hero saves the people but can never be a part of “the people.” He is different, he is above, and is thus alone, a Christ-like figure who must die for our sins. Ford’s conservative views can be seen in a number of his films. In the midst of the Depression, Ford turned John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath (1940) into a hopeful version of an America determined to march on (“Pa, we’re the people”). His 1948 film Fort Apache dealt with manifest destiny. McBride and Wilmington have said that My Darling Clementine (1946) was “probably his most whole heartedly militaristic Western . . . an unambiguous endorsement of militarism as a social principle.”18 In Stagecoach (1939), Ford uses the coach as a metaphor for life in civilized society. Civilization is forced to face a hostile environment: the “savage” Apaches and the untamed West. It is the challenge of the white man to tame the West and conquer the savages. Imperialism and manifest destiny. In The Searchers (1956), Ford returns to the theme of savagery versus civilization. But here Ford begins to paint a more complex, more disturbing portrait of the hero. He uses the approach of the hero-as-outsider, with John Wayne playing the role of Ethan Edwards.

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Ethan’s brother’s family is massacred by Indians. Debbie (Natalie Wood), Ethan’s niece, survives, but she is taken and raised by the Indians. Ethan dedicates his life to getting revenge and sets out with Martin, a “half-breed” raised by the murdered family, to rescue Debbie. Soon his mission changes from its original purpose, which was to find Debbie, and becomes a personal obsession, an obsession to kill Debbie because she has become, for him, the enemy: an Indian. His neurotic hatred toward Indians and his determination to get revenge drive Ethan on a five-year journey. Ethan’s search represents much more than rescuing Debbie. For Ethan, the Indians represent the threat of anarchism—a world without order. His conservative impulses force him to eliminate those forces that would destroy order. As the search progresses, Ethan begins to lose touch with reality. His need for revenge takes shape in his determination to kill Debbie. Finally, the moment comes when Ethan and Debbie confront one another, and we are still not sure if Ethan can and will kill her. Then Ethan picks her up and says, “Let’s go home, Debbie.” But there is no home for Ethan; he remains—as he must be—the outsider. The movie ends in reverse of its opening, with Ethan standing alone. Ford seems to be showing the fall of the individual as hero. Indeed, the hero is different—separate—from the rest of society. He is not really a part, he is above, and thus a loner. But Ford begins to show us that society too may be an enemy of the individual Christ/savior hero. Ethan’s goal was to protect order and family, but in the end, there was no family for Ethan. There is no room for a true hero in society; the individual hero is smothered by society. It is the price we pay for “civilization”: the hero as perpetual loner. It is an idea Ford returns to in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) is perhaps the most explicit presentation of the philosophy that Ford developed. It is a film about the transition from the settling of the wild West to the civilized West. Its two central characters are Tom Doniphon (John Wayne), the rugged man of the Old West, and Rance (Jimmy Stewart), the Easterner who comes to bring the rule of law to the West. The villain is Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin), whose name Liberty stands not for liberty but for license, a confusion that would continue to haunt the United States throughout history. Tom and Rance represent the values of the West versus the East. Each accepts a different approach to life, and each represents a different stage of American history. Clearly, Ford longs for the values of the Old West. But Ford faces the fact that progress (and all it brings with it) is intruding on the purity of the Old West. The film opens with Rance (now a prominent politician) returning to a small Western town to attend the funeral of Tom. In a flashback, Rance tells the story of the man in the coffin and how their lives were linked. Rance first

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came to the town on a stagecoach where he was robbed and beaten by Liberty Valance. Rance vows to bring the force of “the law” on Valance. But Valance responds by beating Rance and shouting, “I’ll teach you law—Western law!” After being brought to town, Rance and Tom discuss what has transpired. Rance says that he will see that Liberty is put in jail, not killed, to which Tom answers, “Out here a man settles his own accounts.” Rance says, “You’re saying what he said! What kind of community have I come to?” He has come to a community in transition where Tom represents the past and Rance represents the future. The movie develops a rivalry between Tom and Rance, a rivalry for the heart of Hallie (Vera Miles), and a symbolic rivalry for the future of the West. During a confrontation between Rance and Liberty, it is Tom who intercedes to save Rance by the threat of the gun. Liberty backs down and Tom asks Rance, “Now, I wonder what scared him off? The spectacle of law and order?” Rance then insists, “I’m staying, but I’m not buying a gun!” Rance becomes the town lawyer and schoolteacher, and it appears that he is making progress, but Valance returns and disrupts the town and the school, leaving Rance alone in the classroom where “Education is the basis of law and order” is written on the blackboard. Finally, Rance gives in and decides to adopt the way of the gun. Eventually this leads to the classic “Western” confrontation, the showdown between Rance and Liberty. Amazingly, Rance shoots Valance, and Rance becomes the town hero, and goes on to become a prominent public figure. But who really shot Liberty Valance? The flashback comes to an end, and we see an elderly Rance Stoddard finishing his story to the editor of the local newspaper. Tom, not Rance, is the real hero, as it was Tom who really shot Liberty Valance. But the editor refuses to print “the truth,” insisting that “this is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” On the train back, Rance asks his wife Hallie if she would like to return home (the West) to live. “If you know how often I dreamed of it” she says. “My roots are here, I guess my heart is here. . . . Look at it. It was once a wilderness. Now it’s a garden.” Their conversation is interrupted by the conductor, who tells Rance that the train he is to catch will be held up till he arrives. Stoddard thanks the conductor, who replies, “Nothing’s too good for the man who shot Liberty Valance.” Rance and Hallie sink silently into their seats. As in The Searchers, this film ends with a reverse image of its opening: a train pulling away. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance shows us the rise of civilization and the death of the Old West. A personal code of ethics (primitive honor as displayed by Tom) gave way to an impersonal set of rules (the law displayed by Rance). Tom saw change coming and helped pave the way for Rance’s emergence. At

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that fictitious point in history, both men were needed to mark the transition of power from the rule of the gun to the rule of law. Ford bemoans the replacing of old values with this new code, but he begrudgingly accepts it. As film critic Andrew Sarris writes: In accepting the inevitability of the present while mourning the past, Ford is a conservative rather than a reactionary. What he wishes to conserve are the memories of old values even if they have to be magnified into legends.19

When the legend becomes fact, print the legend. This is precisely what Ford has done—filmed the legend. In John Ford’s films we can see how America has changed and how our view of heroism has also changed. As Jack Beatty has written: John Ford’s films are moving documents of the conservative imagination. Their themes are the necessity of unity, order, law, community. Their most common dramatic situation involves men enduring a physical and moral ordeal, in which, as Ford once put it, “Individuals become aware of each other” because they have been brought face to face “with something larger than themselves.”20

Ford tells us that there are larger issues than “self.” His heroes go about defending rules and standards, higher principles. These values take precedence over all else and we must, occasionally, sacrifice self for these values. Citizen Kane (1941) gives us a glimpse into the pursuit of power and prestige. “Rosebud” . . . Charles Foster Kane’s last words. It is the mystery we are asked to unravel in Citizen Kane (1941). Kane, based on real-life newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst, is the story of a man who rises gloriously and falls tragically. It is a study of narcissism and dysfunctional leadership. It is as well a parable about the use and misuses of power. Kane (Orson Welles) is a man of great drive and talent. As a young boy, he inherits a fortune and as a young man builds on it, amassing great wealth and power. In the process, he is transformed from an ambitious, driven man with a decidedly deficient emotional intelligence to a greedy monster. He builds then destroys, rises then falls. Kane is an obsessed Ahab who is defeated by his white whale, “Rosebud.” Citizen Kane traces the rise and fall of a larger-than-life figure who becomes a failed monomaniac. We initially see a young Kane, brimming with ambition, principle, energy, talent, and a compelling vision. As a young editor and publisher of a small failing newspaper, he halts production late one night to put out a special edition, the headline of which is Declaration of Principles, his promise to his readers:

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Figure 4.1.  Citizen Kane, 1941 Source: Allstar Picture Library Ltd. Alamy Stock Photo

Kane: There’s something I’ve got to get into this paper besides pictures and print. I’ve got to make the New York Inquirer as important to New York as the gas in that light.

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Leland: What’re you going to do, Charlie? Kane: Declaration of Principles. Don’t smile, Jedidiah. Got it all written out: Declaration of Principles. Bernstein: You don’t want to make any promises, Mr. Kane, you don’t want to keep. Kane: These’ll be kept. I’ll provide the people of this city with a daily paper that will tell all the news honestly. I will also provide them . . . Leland: That’s the second sentence you started with “I” . . . Kane: People are going to know who’s responsible. And they’re going to get the truth in the Inquirer quickly and simply and entertainingly, and no special interests are going to be allowed to interfere with that truth. I’ll also provide them with a fighting and tireless champion of their rights as citizens and as human beings.

Yet, while delivering these inspiring words, director Orson Welles has Kane shrouded in dark shadow, implying that there may be more—or less—here than meets the eye. The young Kane fully intends—at that moment—to keep his promise. And yet, the young Kane devolves into an arrogant, narcissistic, selfish brute of a man, and his high-minded principles become mere wind. Kane begins his journey with the best of intentions and great energy and skill, yet this gets corrupted as he strives for power and hungers for more. And more is never enough. What is the source of this insatiable hunger? As darker impulses take over, his need to dominate and control leads to closed-mindedness, arrogance, and misstep upon misstep. As his drives become obsessions, including a failed run for governor of New York and a shameless bullying lifestyle, he descends into a world where self-control eludes him, and the control of others becomes his manic pursuit. In explaining himself, Kane says, “I am, always will be, and always have been one thing: an American.” Kane represents a caricature of American power which is not entirely flattering. As film critic Bernard F. Dick writes: The popular conception of Kane, confused and contradictory, is no different from the popular conception of America: the republic to which we pledge allegiance, the democracy we claim we are, the empire we have become. The three faces of America become Kane’s three faces. First, he is the republican editor who delegates authority to his representatives; then, he is the democratic leader, promising in his Declaration of Principles to be a champion of human rights; finally, he is the imperialist, bald and gowned, an oriental potentate living in splendor at Xanadu.21

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Why was Kane unable to find meaning or happiness? He had “everything” and yet, he was unfulfilled. What went wrong? In Gerald Mast’s words: The answer is a dark, sickly spot at the heart of Kane’s values and, by implication, at the heart of the values of American life. The three abstract themes that constantly flow through Citizen Kane are wealth, power, and love. The questions that the film raises are whether the first two exclude the third, and whether a life that excludes the third is worth living at all.22

Must power corrupt? It certainly corrupted Charles Foster Kane, but can power be tamed? Directed toward goodness? America’s constitutional framers believed that only through separating power and creating separate institutional branches could power be controlled. Citizen Kane vividly reminds us, as does the Willie Stark figure in All the King’s Men, the Academy Award–winning film version of Robert Penn Warren’s classic political novel based on Huey Long, of the dangers of unchecked power. The Godfather (Parts I and II, 1972 and 1974) follows up on Kane in that they too see a dark underbelly of power in America. The story of a family of American immigrants from Italy who rise through organized crime, one of the few avenues open to immigrants of skill and ambition at that time, it is both an homage to individual leadership and group power, and a story of corruption and violence. The Corleone family, led first by the patriarch Don Vito (Marlin Brando) and later by his son Michael (Al Pacino), knows what power is and how to use it, in its subtle and brutal forms. A key lesson they learned early is to remember that “it’s business, it isn’t personal.” The family is focused and goal directed. And like the television series The Sopranos (1999–2007), organized crime must be very organized. In that world, there are clear rules, just not society’s rules. Honor, respect, and dignity are important, yet power must be respected. These Machiavellian masterminds, at their best, are the essence of what Niccolò Machiavelli meant when in The Prince he referred to the need for an effective prince to exercise Virtu, the ability to master the manly arts of power and war, to recognize when kindness was necessary and when force was required, and to disguise a situation and be able to skillfully apply the proper remedy. It was power with purpose. There is an art to the exercise of power, and Don Vito Corleone is an excellent teacher. His hot-headed son, Sonny, did not learn the father’s lessons, but son, Michael, did. Part of wisdom is knowing what you don’t know, and being humble enough, and willing enough, to learn.

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WAR No decision of government is more consequential than to take a country to war. Wars are horrible, yet war stories can be compelling. They may be stories of individual heroism against great odds of facing and conquering fears, of the good guys defeating the evil, or the “men” of a unit working as a “band of brothers” to achieve their goals. War films have been a staple of our movie diet. Movies that both glorify war and promote anti-war messages are a powerful draw for audiences, and the stories of war, human stories, can often be related to, even by those who have not directly experienced the horrors of war. Paths of Glory (1957) is one such film. The title of this film comes from a line in the eighteenth-century romantic poet Thomas Gray’s Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard: “The paths of glory lead but to the grave.” Paths of Glory is a film dealing with injustice and dysfunctional leadership. Set in France in 1916 during World War I, it is a powerful anti-war film. Inspired by a true story from the Battle of Verdun, it tells the story of military madness and injustice. In a palatial chateau, surrounded by luxury, the French high command plot strategy. Corps commander General George Broulard, a scheming, self-centered leader, meets with General Paul Miraeu, his snobbish subordinate. “I’ve come to see you about something big,” Broulard tells Mireau, “the taking of a fortified German stronghold known as Ant Hill.” It is a suicide mission, doomed from the start. Mireau expresses skepticism. “It’s out of the question, George. Absolutely out of the question. My division was cut to pieces. What’s left of it is in no position to even hold the Ant Hill, let alone take it. I’m sorry, but that’s the truth.” But as we know, truth is the first casualty in war, and Broulard does not want to hear the truth; he wants a victory that will catapult him in the eyes of his superiors. He appeals to Mireau’s vanity. You will be considered a “fighting general,” get another star, be a hero. Mireau demurs. Mireau: I am responsible for the lives of 8,000 men. What is my ambition against that? What is my reputation in comparison to that? My men come first of all, George. And those men know it, too. Broulard: I know that they do. Mireau: You see, George, those men know that I would never let them down. Broulard: (unimpressed, with a glib reply) That goes without saying. Mireau: The life of one of those soldiers means more to me than all the stars and decorations and honors in France.

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Broulard is persistent and appeals to Mireau’s vanity finally work. “Nothing is beyond these men,” he finally says. “Once their fighting spirit is aroused . . . we might just do it!” Delusion becomes self-delusion, and the suicide mission goes forward. Just prior to the assault, a resplendent Mireau visits his troops. The contrast between the immaculate Mireau and the squalor and mud-soaked troops is striking, and Mireau is visibly uncomfortable in the trenches with his warriors. Mireau visits Colonel Dax (Kirk Douglas), the regimental commander, the man who will be responsible for the attack on Ant Hill. Mireau hesitantly presents the plan of attack to Dax: Naturally, men are gonna have to be killed, possibly a lot of them. They’ll absorb bullets and shrapnel, and by doing so make it possible for others to get through . . . say five percent killed by our own barrage—that’s a very generous allowance. Ten percent more again in no man’s land, and twenty percent more again into the wire. That leaves sixty-five percent in actually taking the Ant Hill—we’re still left with a force more than adequate to hold it.

Dax isn’t buying what the general is selling. He knows this is a hopeless suicide mission. Mireau appeals to Dax’s patriotism, to which Dax responds with the Samuel Johnson quote, “Patriotism . . . is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” Mireau then threatens Dax, informing him he will be relieved from his command. Finally, Dax concedes. Unsurprisingly, the attack is an utter failure. The first wave is nearly wiped out within a few feet of the trenches. The rest of the men refuse to attack. Eventually the mission is called off. But Mireau cannot admit his mistake. He blames failure on the cowardice of the troops and orders three men selected by lot to be executed as an example to the troops. Dax tries in vain to defend his men, but his cause is doomed from the start. In the final scene, a German woman is dragged before the French troops and forced to entertain them with a song. The rowdy French mock her as she sings a German folk tune that is ironically really a French song. The mood changes as they realize how little really separates them from their enemy. Banned in France for twenty years, Paths of Glory is a frontal assault on the hypocrisy of military justice, the danger of selfish leadership, the damage done by corrupt and callous leaders, the danger when there is a gap between leaders and followers, the destructive capacity of the “politics and fog of war,” and the effects when leaders don’t care for the welfare of followers and think only of themselves. Other war films to note include Patton (1970), a conservative-oriented celebration of strong leadership, which presents a view opposite of the message from Paths of Glory.

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General Patton is presented as a bulldog of a leader who, by force of personality, drives his men to victory. Saving Private Ryan (1998) graphically portrays the violence of war; it does not glorify it. It deals with the search for a paratrooper (Private Ryan) and tells the story of US Army Rangers Captain John H. Miller (played by Tom Hanks) with his squad who are charged with saving Ryan. If Patton glorifies war, Saving Private Ryan presents a more gruesome reality. Perhaps surprisingly, comedy has often been used in dealing with questions of war. Duck Soup (1933), a Marx Brothers’ farce mocks leaders and international diplomacy with slapstick. An all-out attack on the sanctity of the state, Duck Soup was, in the words of Andrew Bergman, “an attack against political anything; it came out of the deepest cynicism about all government. What is perfectly clear after ten minutes of the film is that the whole idea of statehood and national loyalty is preposterous. The very idea of political action becomes a bad joke.”23 Duck Soup concerns the affairs of a mythical country, Freedonia. Groucho (Rufus T. Firefly) is named president of the country on the insistence of Margaret Dumont (Mrs. Teasdale). From then on, madness becomes commonplace. Groucho insults Mrs. Teasdale, Trentino, the ambassador from a rival nation, Sylvania, and anything else in his way. In the midst of the Marx Brothers’ mayhem are inserted barbs headed right at the heart of diplomacy and politics. Groucho finds the secretary of war “out of order” (truer words were never spoken). At his trial Chico (Chicolini) is accused of selling Freedonia’s secret plans, to which he answers, “Sure, I sold a coat and two pairs of plans.” For this Groucho suggests that he be sentenced to ten years at Leavenworth or eleven years at Twelveworth or, as Chico adds, five-and-ten at Woolworth. All of this diplomacy-as-farce leads, of course, to war between Freedonia and Sylvania. This war is declared over the most trivial of possible insults to Groucho’s honor. It seems that Groucho is afraid that he will be publicly insulted if Ambassador Trentino refuses his handshake, and this leads to Groucho insulting Trentino for what he is afraid Trentino might do. This leaves Trentino “no choice” but to declare war! Just like reality? This handshake incident was, as Bergman notes, “a beautiful parody of the kind of protocol lapses, flag incidents and so on, that have maneuvered into pretexts for carnage. By such trifles do nations define their honor.”24 When war is declared, the Marx Brothers with a full chorus, burst out with “We got guns, they got guns, all God’s children got guns.” Harpo is about to go out to meet the enemy and Groucho says, “While you’re out there risking life and limb . . . we’ll be in here thinking what a sucker you are.” Patriotism, to the (Groucho) Marxist, is absurd. The war scene is a series of rapid-fire gags, with Groucho changing uniforms for each

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scene, suggesting the universality of diplomatic insanity and war. It is sheer madness, which is precisely the point. The Marx Brothers represent the comic subversion of authority and social convention. In their films, we laugh at those very conventions which we daily uphold. It is for our unflinching acceptance of the absurd authority of the state that the Marx Brothers deride us. We tolerate and support the organized insanity of the state; the state is insane; the Marx Brothers are not. Charlie Chaplin, “the little Tramp,” tried to use humor to disarm and demystify Nazism and Hitler in his 1940 classic, The Great Dictator. In the film, Chaplin plays Hitler and mocks and ridicules the pompous dictator. But does humor work in the face of such horrors? While the film makes it clear that Hynkel (or Hitler) is to be mocked, to be laughed at, there is still a clear warning in the film. Hitler, Chaplin tells us, is dangerous. But even Chaplin had afterthoughts concerning the film. As he said: “Had I known of the actual horrors of the German concentration camps, I would not have made The Great Dictator. I could not have made fun of the homicidal insanity of the Nazis.”25 The conclusion of the film—where Chaplin breaks out of the Hynkel character and makes an impassioned plea for human brotherhood—raised a certain amount of criticism. The problem was not in Chaplin’s message, but in its presentation. Some critics felt that Chaplin’s cliché-ridden speech was out of context for the film and was politically naïve as well. The concluding speech from The Great Dictator reads in part: We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness—not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls—has barricaded the world with hate—has goosestepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish.

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Figure 4.2.  The Great Dictator, 1940 Source: Alamy Stock Photo

By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfill that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to free the world—to do away with national barriers—to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason—a world where science and progress will lead to the happiness of us all. Soldiers, in the name of democracy, let us unite!26

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Whether the Little Tramp’s oration at film’s end was out of place or not, it is clear that Chaplin presented a powerful political message to his audience. Through comedy (and, in the end, melodrama), Charlie Chaplin condemned Hitler and fascism. It was a film people flocked to see; it was a film with a message and a purpose. In Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), starring Peter Sellers playing multiple roles, including President Merkin Muffley and Dr. Strangelove (a Germanic mad scientist who is central to the US nuclear arms strategy), is a hilarious descent into nuclear madness. In the 1960s, fear of nuclear annihilation seemed quite real. The 1963 Cuban Missile Crisis brought the United States and Soviet Union to the brink of war, and many feared that at some point an all-out nuclear war—which would have destroyed the world—was a distinct possibility. All the facts, documentaries, scientific studies, policy speeches, books, and essays told the story, but bringing the story to life was the job of movies. And Strangelove is a funny and frightening warning. General Jack D. Ripper orders US aircrafts to attack the Soviet Union. When US officials in the War Room got wind of the order, they call the planes back. But one plane proceeds on its route, unable to receive the recall order. As tensions rise and the US bomber closes in on its target, President Merkin Muffley, along with his top advisers, fail to get the bomber to back away. The

Figure 4.3.  Dr. Strangelove, 1964 Source: Archive Pl, Alamy Stock Photo

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President causes a ruckus by bringing Soviet Ambassador Alexi de Sadeski into the War Room in hopes that Muffley and the Soviet ambassador can get the Soviet premier Dimitri Kissov on the hotline to warn him of the pending attack and help him shoot down the US bomber. Amid this chaos, ambassador de Sadeski reveals that the Soviet Union has developed a “doomsday machine” that will launch a nuclear retaliation strike if it detects that the Soviet Union is attacked. Enter Dr. Strangelove. He begins planning for a post-apocalypse world where top US officials—and numerous young, fertile women—would go into underground shelters to rebuild the world after it is destroyed. As Strangelove begins to detail his plan, we shift attention to the bomber which lost fuel and had to recalibrate its bomb site (thereby avoiding Soviet planes sent to destroy it). The film ends with the plane’s pilot, Major T.J. “King” Kong, riding the nuclear missile downward toward its target, riding it like a rodeo cowboy. Making nuclear annihilation funny, like making Nazism funny in The Great Dictator, is a tough sell. Did it work? Did it get people to think seriously about a serious topic, or was it just entertainment? POLITICAL LEADERSHIP What message do films convey about leaders and leadership, especially democratic leadership? Who leads? Why and how do they lead? And why and how do we follow? Do the stories of leadership lead us to become more discerning democratic citizens, or do they encourage us to be followers and passive observers of the political drama? In most films, leaders and heroes are portrayed as lone wolfs who exhibit extraordinary skill and resolve and overcome adversity against great odds, defeating evil on their own. Of course, such a scenario makes for a great story, but is usually a misrepresentation of reality and sends a damaging democratic message to citizens: sit back, watch great men (almost always men), they will save you. To illustrate how movies sell us on a vision of leadership that is largely pro-heroic and anti-democratic let us compare the 1952 Western classic High Noon with Norma Rae (1979). In High Noon, Will Kane (Gary Cooper) is the marshal of Hadleyville, New Mexico Territory. He cleaned up Hadleyville and brought law and order to this rough-and-tumble frontier town. As the movie opens, he marries Amy (Grace Kelly), an attractive and innocent Quaker pacifist. Kane is about to retire as marshal and become a storekeeper in another town.

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But Kane learns that outlaw Frank Miller, whom Kane brought to justice, has been released from prison and plans to return to Hadleyville with his gang to exact revenge. The battle lines are drawn. Kane explores his options. He can leave town and retire as originally planned, organize a posse to defend against Miller’s assault, or act alone. Kane prudently opts for the second approach (which is what was usually done in the Old West). At a church service, the sheriff enters and addresses the townspeople. He reminds them of what is at stake and says, “I’m going to need to deputize all the men I can get.” But a fearful congregation raise concerns about the dangers of this strategy, with one man shouting, “Hey, this isn’t our job. That’s what we pay the sheriff for!” Other voices rise to defend the sheriff, with one man saying, “This man made this town safe for our families. Most of us remember when Frank Miller and his gang made it unsafe to leave our homes. Some people even left to seek a safer place to settle. Now that he needs our help, we have to give it to him.” In the end, the voices of fear prevail. There will be no posse to take on Frank Miller and his band. Kane is the man Miller is after, and the townspeople leave Kane alone to deal with him. Frank Miller is set to arrive on the noon train. The consensus of the church gathering, as well as that of others in the town, is that Kane should leave town. The dilemma Kane is faced with is a sense of duty to his old town versus love and personal safety. Duty prevails. Kane faces the gunmen—alone. In a confrontation he shoots two of Miller’s men and he himself is wounded. When Amy, who has boarded an outgoing train, intent on leaving this violence behind her, hears the gunshots, she leaves the train and hurries back to the main street in town. Amy must choose between her deeply held religious beliefs and her new husband. She shoots the third gunman in the back. Miller takes Amy hostage and offers Kane a trade: Amy for Kane. Kane agrees. But Amy fights back, clawing Miller’s face. Amy escapes Miller’s grip and Kane shoots him. As the dust settles, the townspeople come out of hiding. They are in awe. Yet Kane contemptuously rips his badge off, throws it in the dirt, and, along with his wife, rides out of town. Will Kane is a man of courage, skill, accomplishment, and integrity. He is admired by a grateful town. He seems every bit the heroic, ideal, and fearless leader. Yet, he is not a leader. Leaders have followers, and Kane can’t get the townspeople to follow. He is a lone wolf, a heroic lone wolf, but in the end, a man who acts alone (nearly). Despite an impending crisis, Will Kane is unable to articulate and sell a compelling vision. He is unable to inspire others to follow. He succeeds in his immediate task (killing Miller and his men) but fails as a leader. Good does triumph over evil, yet not because Kane is an

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effective leader. We learn in High Noon, as we did in To Kill a Mockingbird (1962), that courage can be a lonely endeavor. As a historical side note, High Noon was made in 1952 in the heat of the Red Scare, the McCarthy era, the anticommunist hysteria, and the Hollywood blacklist. A witch hunt to identify and destroy both Communists and leftists devastated the film industry. Hollywood retreated from making “problem films” and produced homogenized “safe” films. If one wanted to attack the blacklist, it had to be done indirectly, by allegory. Films like High Noon and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) were condemnations of the cowardliness of the blacklist and the cowardliness of those who caved into the pressure and cooperated with the assault on rights in that era. Carl Foreman, the author, as well as the uncredited producer, of High Noon, was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) to testify under oath and “name names” of Communists in Hollywood. Foreman was considered an “un-cooperative witness” and was later blacklisted and not permitted to work in Hollywood. In this context, High Noon is about one man standing up to evil (Miller and his gang in the movie, HUAC and the blacklist in real life). As the townspeople answered in fear, so too did many in the Hollywood community, who stood by quietly as friends and coworkers were (sometimes) unfairly blacklisted. While most Hollywood films as well as popular myths and expectations focus on the individual—great men—leading and causing change, Norma Rae (Sally Field) takes a different approach. Yes, there is the heroic leader (in this case, a woman), but this is not the story of a leader alone. It is the tale of a leader and followers. Norma Rae’s success is dependent on concerted group action, on followers—on politics. The movie is loosely based on the life of Crystal Lee Sutton, a labor organizer in North Carolina. It is the story of how one woman organizes her coworkers to form a union at the textile factory in which they work. A careful reading of history, as well as a careful viewing of the film, should lead one to the conclusion that although leadership is important, followership is essential as well. Would Patton have won his many battles had his men failed to follow and execute? The Godfather’s Don Corleone, standing alone, is merely a man, easily disposed of. What is Lawrence (of Arabia) without his Bedouin followers? Leaders need followers, as High Noon’s hero Will Kane so painfully discovered. This is the yin and yang of leadership. It is a two-way street, a symbiotic relationship; one can’t exist without the other. And Hollywood just doesn’t get it. In a break from Hollywood tradition, Norma Rae explicitly recognizes the importance of followers and the impact of collective action in politics. The

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film pays tribute to leadership, yet not in the John Wayne/Clint Eastwood tradition. Norma is a flawed person. She is presented warts and all. And yet, she, along with her coworkers, accomplishes a significant victory against considerable odds. Norma is an everyday common person, and yet she acts, leads, and wins. She wins not because of her superhuman skills but because, in the real world, real people often lead others, inspire others, and mobilize others. Norma Rae works at a minimum wage factory job. She and her coworkers are poorly treated, and at first, Norma sees no option but to put up with it. After all, her parents did, and most of her friends do. However, after hearing a speech by a visiting union organizer, she decides to try to help start a union. After a long and difficult struggle, Norma Rae and her coworkers succeed in forming a union. Norma Rae is determined, focused, goal oriented, resilient, willing to take a risk, and able to articulate and sell a vision of a better tomorrow. She has a little education but loads of determination. With the help of New York organizer Warshowsky, her teacher and mentor, she learns as she leads. In one telling scene, Norma Rae faces possible defeat, for herself, her cause, and her coworkers. Her followers just aren’t following. On the factory floor she climbs on a table and holds a sign that simply reads UNION. She stands there, sign held above her head, while the workers continue to work, and the machinery continues to whir. She stands there on the edge of defeat for a full three minutes (which seem like a lifetime), and not one of her coworkers has the courage to stand up with her. There was no “Spartacus moment.” She puts herself fully on the line for the union and her coworkers. Yet she stands alone. UNION, a one-word promise, a vision for the future. Norma Rae stands there, alone and frightened, yet she refuses to retreat, refuses to step down. Finally, the factory workers slowly—one by one—turn off their machines. The factory that was buzzing with the sound of machinery in motion draws quiet until a deafening silence overtakes the factory floor. Norma Rae leads, her coworkers join her, and working together, win a vote to unionize. High Noon tells us that leaders solve our problems; Norma Rae tells us that we, together, must take responsibility and solve our own problems. Yes, leadership is important, but so is politics, organizing, agitating, and coalition-building. High Noon tells us that politics is a spectator sport; Norma Rae reminds us that politics is a participatory activity. Another film about leadership is the 2008 movie Milk. It deals with an unlikely political leader. From apolitical outsider to activist, to insider, to martyr, Harvey Milk, the man, mattered; Milk the movie does as well. In 1977, community activist Harvey Milk was elected to the San Francisco board of supervisors, becoming the first openly gay man elected to public

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office in the United States. His journey to political prominence and leadership is as unlikely as was his shocking death tragic. At age forty, Milk leaves New York City hoping to change his life. Along with partner Scott Smith, Milk moves across the country, settling in San Francisco’s Castro District, where he and Smith open a camera shop. Frustrated at the injustice Milk sees in everyday life, this outsider develops an interest in his community and plunges into the heated world of San Francisco politics. Milk focuses on economic development and gay rights. He reaches out to local small businesses, the gay as well as straight communities, and trade unions, building broad-based coalitions. When the Teamsters want to strike against the Coors Company for refusing to sign a union contract, Milk gets the gay bars in the area to stop selling Coors beer. In exchange, Milk convinces the Teamsters to agree to hire more gay drivers. He then coaxes local Arab and Chinese grocers not to sell Coors beer. The boycott is successful and serves as a model of Milk’s future coalitions that cut across political lines. He is soon dubbed “the mayor of Castro Street.” He enjoys the attention and spotlight his political activities afford him, and Milk soon becomes the go-to guy in the Castro District as well as the lightning rod for the gay community. He decides to run for public office. In spite of his notoriety—perhaps because of it—he loses in three successive electoral efforts. In 1977, he decides to give it another try. In previous attempts, Milk ran in at-large races. Now, a new district electoral system seems to afford him a better chance of success. Milk tries to build bridges, forge coalitions, bring the gay community together, develop consensus, and reach out to senior citizens, union members, and small business owners, developing a broad-based political coalition. To the surprise of many, he wins a seat on the board. As a supervisor, Milk sponsors a civil rights bill that outlaws discrimination based on one’s sexual orientation. Yet, Milk becomes much more than merely a gay politician, as he reaches out and promotes the interests of the broader community. Part of his coalition-building effort involves bringing another newly elected supervisor, Dan White, into his coalition. This proves problematic as their political agendas pull them apart and their personalities clash, leading to tragedy. White is troubled. After serving for ten months as a supervisor, White resigns his position. Within days, he seeks reappointment to the same position. After initially agreeing, Mayor George Moscone reneges on his word and refuses to appoint White. On November 27, 1978, Mayor Moscone plans to announce White’s replacement. But shortly before the scheduled press conference, White sneaks

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into the basement of city hall, goes to Moscone’s office, and shoots the mayor in the shoulder and chest; then, after Moscone has fallen to the floor, White shoots him twice in the head. He reloads his gun, walks to his former office, sees Milk, and asks for a meeting. White shoots Milk five times, including two close-range shots to the head. At his trial, White’s attorney claimed “diminished capacity,” the result of White’s anguished mental state and a steady diet of sugar-laden junk food that led him to explode. This was dubbed “the Twinkie defense.” Amazingly, it worked. White was acquitted of first-degree murder but found guilty on two counts of voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to seven and two-thirds years in prison. His sentence was reduced for time served and good behavior, and he was released after five years. He committed suicide a few years later. Harvey Milk, an outsider from a group discriminated against, was able to broaden his political appeal and attract coalition partners because he reached out, built bridges, was more than a one-issue advocate, saw injustice and fought it, saw needs and tried to fill them, had a vision, had a passion that was contagious, empowered and animated the gay and, at times, the straight communities, worked tirelessly, and cultivated both a personal as well as a political following. His was a politics of inclusion. Milk, the movie, gives us a portrait not of the leader as superhero but of a real-life leader—warts and all. Milk does not solve problems alone. He enlists others; mobilizes, organizes, and empowers them; and helps to build a community on behalf of the shared common cause. AUTOCRATS IN FILM Autocrats and dictators get things done. Efficiency can be attractive, and the exercise of raw power may impress, but uncontrolled and unaccountable power can also be poison. As George Bernard Shaw reminds us, “You cannot have power for good without having power for evil too. Even mother’s milk nourishes murderers as well as heroes.”27 How do movies deal with autocratic leaders? The Caine Mutiny (1954) deals with the autocratic captain of a dilapidated World War II ship whose new captain is Philip Frances Queeg (Humphrey Bogart), a rigid disciplinarian. From the outset, Queeg is determined to set a new tone for the ship’s crew. I’ve had seven tough years in the Atlantic, and believe you me, they made the last two mighty interesting. The way those subs ganged up on us, I thought they had it in for me personally. . . . Anyone who knows me will tell you I’m a book man. I believe everything in it was put in for a purpose. When in doubt,

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remember on board this ship, we do things by the book. Deviate from the book and you’d better have a half dozen good reasons. And you’ll still get an argument from me. And I don’t lose arguments on board my ship. That’s, uh, one of the nice things about being captain. I want you to remember one thing. On board my ship, excellent performance is standard. Standard performance is substandard. Substandard performance is not permitted to exist. That—I warn you.

Queeg announces that he wants a smarter-looking, spit-and-polish approach and won’t tolerate substandard performance. All shirts are to be tucked in, all men clean shaven, all hair closely cropped. Queeg turns to his second-in-command and says, “There are four ways of doing things on board my ship. The right way, the wrong way, the Navy way, and my way.” A series of avoidable missteps occur, some due to Queeg’s obstinance, some to poor seamanship. Queeg calls a meeting with his officers and asks them for cooperation and loyalty. “Constructive loyalty” is how Queeg terms it. “A ship,” he says, “is like a family. We all have our ideas of right and wrong but we have to pitch in for the good of the family. If there was only some way we could help each other.” The officers’ response is dead silence. They do not like their boss and are unwilling to come to his aid. Tensions build until finally Queeg seems to “lose it” over “the strawberries.” A quart of strawberries goes missing, and Queeg becomes Ahab-like in his search for the thief. Acting like an obsessed mad man, Queeg works out the incident “with perfect geometrical precision.” His officers begin to suspect him of paranoia. What to do? Later, in a raging typhoon, Queeg confronted by the challenges of leadership, seems paralyzed in this turbulent “fog of war.” The ship’s executive officer abruptly relieves Queeg of his command on the grounds of mental instability. The officers steer the ship through the crisis, yet two are later charged with mutiny. The drama shifts to a courtroom, where a defense attorney, Barry Greenwald, gets Queeg on the stand to testify and presses him unrelentingly. Queeg, under stress, breaks. The charges of mutiny are dismissed. At a post-trial party celebrating the officers’ victory, Greenwald shows up. Ashamed that he destroyed a man who had served his country with honor, Greenwald wondered if the wrong man hadn’t been broken. The Caine Mutiny is a complex drama raising more questions than it answers. Yes, Queeg, deficient in social and emotional intelligence, is strange and a bit “off”; yes, he is an autocrat, yet had the officers come to his aid, might things have turned out differently? Queeg’s belated effort at team building seems too little, too late; yet had he built an effective team and enlisted the help of his officers at the outset, things also might have turned out differently.

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Here, the autocrat is portrayed as unstable. But what happens when the autocrat is also an effective leader? Patton (1970) is the story of Lieutenant General George S. Patton. Set during World War II, Patton is a tough, demanding leader. His wartime leadership proves successful—even at a cost. But Patton is a man-for-one-season, even a one-dimensional hero. Well suited to hierarchy and a wartime command environment, Patton is boss, bully, and effective within the narrow confines of war. But does his one-dimensional style of leadership translate to peacetime? In war he is a hero; in peace, a danger. Z (1969), an Algerian-French–made political thriller, is based on the 1963 assassination of Greek leftist politician Grigoris Lambrakis. Clearly presented as an indictment of the military junta that governed Greece, director Konstantinos Gavras (known as Costa-Gavras) pulls no punches. Costa-Gavras’s films are often dramatizations based on real-life situations, and his powerful style makes for both poignant political drama and commercial success. Costa-Gavras was once asked what makes “an effective persuasive political film,” to which he answered, “Persuasion, I personally always thought it was necessary for that kind of movie and use the, if I can say, the ‘Hollywood method’ of making movies or showing stories, because that kind of public an apathetic audience understands very easily, and they go to see that kind of film.” “Z” is a political symbol in Greece meaning “he still lives” and with this film, the story indeed keeps the memory alive, the memory of Gregoris Lambrakis, a professor of medicine who was murdered in 1963. Z is a powerful drama which—some suggest—manipulates the audience in the way Frank Capra’s films did. When asked to comment on this, Costa-Gavras, said “The audience is manipulated anyway, by bad politicians, by bad popcorn sellers, so if you can manipulate them in this way and teach them to be conscious of situations like this then we must manipulate them. I don’t think that when the audience comes out of the theater they will have changed completely, but if, at least, they ask themselves one question then I think that’s enough.”28 These comments are appropriate when viewed in light of the movie Z, for Z was, as Costa-Gavras admitted, a highly manipulative film. On the other hand, Costa-Gravas’s State of Siege (1973) is a controversial film that was scheduled to premiere at an American Film Institute theater in Washington’s Kennedy Center, but AFI head George Stevens Jr. cancelled the showing on the grounds that the film was about a political assassination of an American diplomat. Perhaps a more relevant reason was that the film puts the United States and the CIA in a less than positive light. State of Siege is based on the real-life story of Daniel A. Mitrione, an American who worked for AID in Latin America. Mitrione was killed by guerrillas in Uruguay in 1970. His job in Latin America was, in part, to help

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train and organize what was to become the police force in a repressive political regime. In the movie, Mitrione’s part is played by Yves Montand, named Philip Michael Santore for the film. Costa-Gavras portrays Santore as a warm, intelligent, sensitive family man, and in portraying him as a strong sympathetic figure, Costa-Gavras moves away from the Hollywood style good guy/bad guy conflict, to depict both sides as having human qualities. But there is one problem: the strong, warm figure is engaging in atrocities in the name of the United States. Costa-Gavras here gives us what may be the most insightful depiction of the post–World War II dilemma. The United States engages in some of the most horrible acts without deeply questioning our own goals, motives, or actions. Philip Santore may be a metaphor of the United States in general: he is sincere, intelligent, and warm. So why does he do these horrible things? The United States at least on the surface, has been—or aspires to be—the land of the free, the believer in human rights, the defender of democracy. So why does the United States do these horrible things (e.g., torture, Guantanamo Bay prison)? It is the irony of post–World War II America. In 1982, Costa-Gavras released yet another controversial political melodrama: Missing. Based on a true story of American freelance writer Charles Horman, who disappeared and was later killed during the coup d’état by right-wing elements of the military in Chile in 1973, this film drew an angry response from the US State Department before it ever opened. The State Department released a three-page statement “objecting to the impression left by the film that the United States contrived in the death or had at least covered up events surrounding the case.” The film centers on the missing writer’s father (played by Jack Lemmon) going to a South American country to try to find his son. In the course of the film, we are led to believe that the young writer may have disappeared because he “knew too much” about alleged US involvement in the violent overthrow of the government. While this film takes liberties with facts, it is clear that then President Nixon wanted to rid Chile of its elected Marxist government led by Salvador Allende, and that the CIA and several American corporations aided in the destabilization of the Allende government. The full extent of US involvement in the actual coup remains unclear. But the US government, at the instruction of President Nixon and Henry Kissinger, actively sought to subvert a democratic election in Chile (1970) and attempted to undermine its democratically elected government. Costa-Gavras is one of the few directors who has been able to bridge the gap between the action-driven Hollywood/American-style political film and the more thoughtful European film. His use of real-life stories makes

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his drama more compelling, and his political statements more relevant and dramatic. THE PRESIDENCY We are a presidential nation. It wasn’t supposed to be that way, but in the past two centuries, the presidency has grown in power beyond its constitutional moorings.29 There are multiple causes for this, but one of the elements that explains how the presidency has eclipsed the Congress and the courts is because of how “media friendly” the presidency is, and how modern technology—television, social media, movies—enlarges the office. The presidency is the most media accessible of our governing institutions. Congress consists of hundreds of different voices, multiple leaders, and the legislative process is slow and obtuse. The Supreme Court deliberates behind closed doors, and its work is hidden from our view. By contrast, the presidency is one person, highly visible, easy for the cameras as well as the audience to focus on. Movies thrive on stories of a hero. And given the roughly ninety-minute time limit of a movie, there is no time to develop rich, complex characters. The audience needs someone to root for, and movies provide a ready-made platform for the lone hero to grab our attention. So, too, with television news. It is exceedingly difficult to make Congress the star: too many people, too spread out. The courts, too vailed in secrecy. One person, easy to see, easier still to pass the story through, allows us to focus our attention to the one key central character. Because of this, television news spends most of its airtime focusing on stories about presidents. The president gets more airtime than the Congress and the courts combined. What the audience sees is American government as presidential government. It appears as if all roads—and all power—lead to the White House. With so much attention on the president, and so little on the other two branches of government, the average citizen can be forgiven for confusing time on television news with constitutional authority. In this way, the president’s role is elevated as presidents have become the nation’s “celebrity-in-chief,” the focus of public attention and the focus of star treatment. The role of celebrity-in-chief both elevates and demeans the office. It elevates the presidency by focusing inordinate attention on a single person; it demeans the presidency by often trivializing the office. It can also elevate style over substance, and personality over policy. A disproportionate amount of media attention is focused on one branch while the real workings of government are bypassed. One might easily draw the mistaken impression that the president is the government, so much media

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attention is focused on him. But the United States is a three-part system of government, and false impressions have consequences. The false impression that the president is the government focuses undue attention onto the presidency and heightened public expectations that the president governs almost alone. Early film portrayals of presidents tended to present the president as a “redeemer and hero.”30 It was a sacred office, held by heroic men. Films such as Young Mr. Lincoln (1939), Abe Lincoln of Illusions (1940), Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942), Wilson (1944), State of the Union (1948), Sunrise at Campobello (1960), PT-109 (1963), and Seven Days in May (1964) built up the office and the men who occupied it. This prototypical portrait dominated, even as a few more complex portrayals emerged, such as Gabriel over the White House (1933) and Dr. Strangelove (1964). Movies and television create and then reenforce this misperception. Take the “liberal ideal” image of the presidency as portrayed in the television series The West Wing (1999–2006) and the movie The American President (1995). During the presidency of George W. Bush, liberals yearned for the television presidency to be made real. Air Force 1 (1997) presents the president as an action hero with almost superhuman skill and daring. The president’s plane is hijacked by Kazakh terrorists who are followers of General Ivan Radek, who is imprisoned in Russia. Hoping to gain his release, they take control of Air Force 1. But unknown to the terrorists, President James Marshall (Harrison Ford), who upon the attack on the plane is taken to an escape pod, remains on the plane instead of being safely ejected, and is thus safe and in hiding. The terrorists make their demands and begin killing members of the president’s staff one-by-one, demanding the release of Radek. President Marshall springs into action, killing terrorist after terrorist. When the leader of the terrorists realizes that it is President Marshall who is killing his men, he ratchets up the on-plane search for the president. But superhero that he is, President Marshall defeats the evil terrorists, and all is saved. This entertaining though cartoonlike portrayal of the president as superhero may have consequences. I often tell my students in my course on the US presidency that one of the most difficult things about teaching that course is that students are fed a steady diet of presidents as superheroes that distorts their views of what presidents are capable of achieving. Why can’t our superhuman president stop North Korea from developing nuclear weapons? How can drug lords get away with so much? Why can’t the president even get Congress to obey him? The president as superhero helps create heightened expectations that, in the real world, no president could achieve. The award-winning television series West Wing (1999–2006) portrays the president as a bit more down to earth, but still, he is like the movie The

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American President—an ideological super star where Josiah “Jed” Bartlet is the liberal ideal. A flattering representation of Bartlet may have offered the public hope during the presidency of George W. Bush, but even here, an ideological president is presented as a liberal warrior, a man of warmth, skill, humor, and ability. RACE Racism is a fact of life in America. While improvements have, over time, been made, racism remains a powerful force in political and social life. Racism is also a problem in the film industry, and the portrayal of racially biased images of Blacks in movies as well as Hollywood’s historical tendency to ignore or treat Black themes as invisible has been a problem since the beginning of commercial filmmaking. The early image of Blacks in film were, as Daniel Leab writes, a “Sambo” image: “The movies presented blacks as subhuman, simpleminded, superstitious, and submissive. They exhibited qualities of foolish exaggeration and ignorance as well as an addictive craving for fried chicken and watermelon. Their relationship with whites was depicted as one of complete and frequently childlike dependence.”31 Blacks historically took a second-class place in films if they appeared at all. Working (rarely) in an industry dominated by Anglos, Blacks had a difficult time entering the world of film. As James Monaco writes, “with a few exceptions, Blacks simply didn’t exist as real people in American movies until at least half a century after the viciously racist classic Birth of a Nation marked the beginning of feature film.32 Racism isn’t something we’re born with. It must be learned. From parents and neighbors, in schools and on television, from bogus “academic” studies and from the deepest recesses of hatred, racism is taught and learned. Movies have historically been one of the prime conveyers of ignorance and hatred. And where else would one start in our quest to understand the role of racism in movies than The Birth of a Nation, D.W. Griffith’s 1915 silent film “classic?” It celebrates the story of the birth of the Ku Klux Klan. This film contained a glorification of the Ku Klux Klan and painted a degrading picture of Blacks. On its release, it caused an uproar among Blacks and liberal whites. It was the first of many anti-Black films. One of the most outlandish portrayals of Blacks in film can be seen in Gone with the Wind (1939). This film was the other side of the coin of racism from Birth of a Nation. Where Birth of a Nation was anti-Black because it made Blacks out to be dangerous and vicious, Gone with the Wind showed blacks

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to be ignorant and servile, the “simpleminded darkies” as one of the film’s characters said. “Mammy,” the Black slave, ever faithful to Scarlett O’Hara, is the archetypical Black person of this period—or so the film would have you believe. (Hattie McDaniel, who played Mammy, won an Academy Award for this performance; she was the first Black actor to ever win an Academy Award.) This film gave the impression that Blacks had a happy life on the plantation and that they enjoyed (or should have enjoyed) slavery. One of America’s finest film actors was Paul Robeson. This great Black actor had a difficult time getting movie parts. Robeson wanted to present the movie audience with realistic images of Blacks, but he was frustrated at every turn. His performance as a Black ruler who suffers an emotional breakdown in The Emperor Jones (1933) was widely acclaimed. But Robeson still had trouble getting parts. He went to England hoping for better opportunities, but with little success. Back in Hollywood, Robeson played the part of Joe in the musical Show Boat (1936), a role that Robeson tried (and failed) to change to give the character more dignity. But the role came off as degrading to Blacks, fostering the image that Blacks were lazy. Robeson’s acting was again highly praised and his film rendition of the song “Ol’ Man River” is unforgettable. Probably Robeson’s best role was in The Proud Valley (1940). In this film (made in England) Robeson plays David Goliath, a man who, after wandering about, finally finds work in the mines of Wales. He helps his community, the family he lives with, and finally sacrifices his own life to save his fellow miners. It was a strong role of an honorable man. It was one of Robeson’s few positive roles in his career. Later, Sidney Poitier emerged as one of the most celebrated actors in his time. Films such as A Raisin in the Sun (1961), Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967; for which Poitier was criticized for playing a white man’s version of a Black man), The Bedford Incident (1965), and In the Heat of the Night (1967) placed Poitier in the forefront of the industry. He turned to directing in the early 1970s and became one of the more influential of film’s superstars. By the 1960s, the African American community began to put public pressure on the movie industry, demanding that more Black-themed movies be made, and more Black actors be employed. It has been a long, slow process, but some changes have been made in the past forty years. During the 1970s, the film industry slowly began to open up for Blacks. Movies such as Sounder (1972) began to show the human qualities so lacking in earlier films about African Americans. But while Poitier and others began to make family-type films based on the Black experience, another type of film also began to emerge: the Black exploitation film. These films created

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the “Superspade” hero, the black John Wayne/Clint Eastwood who would “get whitey.” Of these films, Sidney Poitier has written, “Their ‘macho’ films were quite unlike mine. Generally, these Black heroes were seen beating up on white Mafia guys, it was a ‘get whitey’ time—which certainly added immeasurably to the popularity of their films . . . yet I noticed a dangerous disregard of the hopes and aspirations of black people.”33 In 1989, director Spike Lee released Do the Right Thing, a movie about racial tensions centered in an Italian-operated pizzeria located in a predominantly Black New York City neighborhood. Lee openly presents different views on race and the struggle the races have in understanding each other. In 1991, the movie Boyz N the Hood gained widespread attention and a significant audience by presenting a stark view of everyday life in South Central Los Angeles. Directed by John Singleton, the movie’s focus on gang culture and gang life was an eye-opening story that white, as well as African American, audiences were drawn to. A year later, Malcolm X (1992), directed by Spike Lee and starring Denzel Washington in the title role, was released. It was a biographical film about the renowned civil rights activist. In Malcolm X’s life story, we get a glimpse of the subject’s struggle as a Black person growing up in a white world. We see why and how he was drawn into radicalism and activism, and we see his personal struggle with his own identity. While in prison in the late 1940s, he converts to Islam and upon release from prison, becomes a leader in the Nation of Islam movement in the United States. But these films were the exception. It was not until 2016 that we begin to see a renaissance of Black films. Movies such as The Help (2011), Hidden Figures (2016), and Blackklansman (2018), which featured Black women in leading roles, paved the way. Other significant films followed, such as One Night in Miami (2020), and Judas and the Black Messiah (2021). Today, while we have seen some improvements, Hollywood still has a long way to go. But many of these stories give access to white audiences to—even if superficially—enter into a new world, see a different reality, perhaps learn from the stories of African Americans. It is a story that needs to be told and that a wide audience needs to see. Movies such as 12 Years a Slave (2013), Glory (1989), Moonlight (2016), and Judas and the Black Messiah (2021) give audiences a more nuanced, perhaps more realistic portrait of the Black experience in America. Progress, yes, but still a long way to go. Elvis Mitchell’s 2022 documentary, Is That Black Enough for You?, which surveys the history of Blacks in film, is a sweeping historical review that confirms how powerful a force racism was in the industry. But serial and political pressures (as well as commercial concerns) helped open the door for African

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American in the movie industry and the added richness of this inclusion made the industry a bit more just and the product much more compelling. Hispanics and Native Americans have also been portrayed in a less than flattering light. For decades, Native Americans were persecuted as violent, ignorant savages who deserved to be slaughtered. The formulaic Western movie had civilized white settlers trying to settle the West only to be blocked by the savages who already occupied the land. Likewise, Hispanics, when they were seen onscreen at all, were, like Native Americans, usually portrayed as inferior to whites. Exceptions notwithstanding (e.g., Ramona (1936), The Milagro Beanfield War (1954), West Side Story (1961 and 2021), and Blood in Blood Out (1993)), Hispanics have been either ignored or presented as inferior to the “educated and civilized whites.” GENDER For most of film history, women have been portrayed as weak, submissive, subservient, and a backdrop or romantic attachment for the male star. What has been the dominant role model for women? Generally, the image of women in film has been that of the subservient second-class citizen who was to be dominated by men. While there have been some excellent roles for women in film, the general film image of women has been as secondary to men. Women have been discriminated against throughout society (socially, politically, economically), and while the women’s liberation movement continues to have a major impact on American society, there is still a long way to go before we achieve justice and equality. The second-class status of women developed for a number of reasons, and film can in no way be blamed for women’s plight. But movies can indeed be blamed for perpetuating the myth of women’s helplessness. While women have made advances in the twenty-first century as producers, directors, and powerful forces in the industry, they still lag behind males. The dominant film image of women is that of the dutiful wife waiting at home for her man. At the end of the film, we have come to expect that the masculine hero will return home to the loyal wife and “carry her off into the sunset.” Be she a “sex queen” (Marilyn Monroe, Jean Harlow, Rita Hayworth) or a working woman (Katharine Hepburn, Rosalind Russell, Joan Crawford), in the end the woman was expected to give herself up to the man. Using film as a means of understanding the role of women in society can give us a view of how women were viewed by men (who made films), and what men thought was the proper role of the woman in society. Films reflect the male domination of women and film was an effective tool in socializing women into accepting this role. Just as men are pressured into accepting the

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“male dominant” role portrayed in films, so too are women pressured into accepting the “female subservient” role transmitted through film. The secondary status of women in society was commented upon by film scholar Molly Haskell who wrote that, “the big lie perpetrated on Western society is the idea of women’s inferiority, a lie so deeply ingrained in our social behavior that merely to recognize it is to risk unraveling the entire fabric of civilization.”34 Film, as Haskell notes, has helped perpetuate this “big lie.” And, as Andrew Bergman writes, “the woman’s role on film was one of total dependency, the slave not merely of individual men but of a male society, with no options for individual action or genuine freedom. In bed or in the marketplace, the woman could call no tune.”35 Violence against women in our society is one of the most serious problems we confront. And films may contribute to the attitude that it is all right to be violent against women because it is so often portrayed, and occasionally in a positive light. Films such as Dressed to Kill, Straw Dogs, A Clockwork Orange, Raging Bull, and Looking for Mr. Goodbar, and the slasher film genre, present a view that violence against women may be acceptable under certain circumstances. Rare is the film which treats violence against women in an accurate, sensitive, manner—from the point of view of the woman. Films often told us women were “supposed” to give themselves up to men; it was “their proper role.” And this image was projected to millions and millions of viewers for decade after decade. Young girls looking at movies learned how they were expected to behave and what their rewards would be for such behavior (getting the hero). The “good” news is that the past forty years, movies about strong women, positive images of women, and a growing sensitivity to issues affecting women have become more evident. In 1979, Alien presented a strong woman as the spaceship’s commander. In the 1983 film Silkwood, the female lead (Meryl Streep) is a labor union activist who work in an Oklahoma nuclear facility. She turns whistle-blower and takes on corporate power. Erin Brockovich (2000), based on a true story, deals with a woman who fought against an energy company over its culpability for contaminating water.36 The Hunger Games series (2012–2015) is a science fiction portrayal of a dystopian future starring Jennifer Lawrence. She plays Katniss Everdeen, a “tribute” chosen to compete in the Hunger Games for the amusement of the audience as the contestants fight to the death. Katniss has skill and guile, and she survives and thrives as a strong woman who more than holds her own in this competition to the death. Zero Dark Thirty (2012) takes place in the US war against terrorism. Maya Harris (Jessica Chastain) is a CIA operative charged with finding Al-Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden. At a “black site,” she leads the interrogation of a prisoner believed to be a possession of key information. Maya steps up

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the interrogation, going so far as to authorize torture. In this film, a line is crossed. The role of Maya is not a “woman’s role.” Her character could just as easily be played by a male actor. But here we see a woman doing what one might have, in an earlier period, expected a man to do: supervise the subhuman treatment of a prisoner. Is this what equality looks like? And what of the contention that women in power exercise leadership with more compassion than men?37 A woman as a James Bond–type figure? Yes, according to Atomic Blonde (2017).38 Based on a 2012 graphic novel, Atomic Blonde is a spy thriller set in Berlin. Lorraine Broughton (Charlize Theron) is a female James Bond, with car chases, hand-to-hand combat, and all the glitz and glamour of a super-spy. Again, this film defies expectations as Lorraine is a gender-bender who is every bit as “cool” as Bond, and every bit as skilled as well. If women are increasingly portrayed as smart and skilled, the more traditional subservient role of women in society remains a recurring theme. In Handmaid’s Tale (2017), a television series based on the dystopian novel by Margaret Atwood, women are quite literally handmaids to men and their families. June Osborne (renamed Offred—“Of/Fred”) serves as maid and (hopefully) baby-producer. She and the other handmaids are slaves in this male-dominated dystopian society. This frightening “what if” warning offers a glimpse of a world where women’s rights are virtually nonexistent, where the advances of the past fifty years are wiped out. It is a thought-provoking reminder that rights must be fought for and constantly defended. Much has changed since the early days of filmmaking. Thankfully, in recent years, the story in our heads that portrayed the “proper” role of women as society’s background players has been replaced with a more realistic and hopeful story. GLOBAL POLITICS It is often said that international or global politics is a contest for power and control within a system characterized by anarchy. Some loose norms and some international agreements do guide behavior (some of the time).39 American citizens might be forgiven if, in using the lens of films, they saw global politics as a sci-fi battle of good versus evil, with Star Wars, Star Trek, and a host of other spaghetti-westerns and outer-space dramas, defining the way they view international relations.40 Science fiction films provide a unique opportunity for moviemakers to comment on the implications of human and “nonhuman” behavior. Through science fiction, we can look ahead to the way the world “might” look if the right wing, left wing, scientific rationalists, corporations, robots, aliens, and

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so on took over and created their own Brave New World. It is an opportunity to play out the implications of various political philosophies. Based essentially on moral simplifications, sci-fi usually reduces ideas to caricatures, but with a purpose. Through this, the science fiction film can serve as a warning, cautioning us to the potential dangers of certain courses of action. This type of film attempts to transform (in the viewers’ mind) science fiction into science fact: “here, this is what might happen, if . . . ” Science fiction films work from the premise that man is rational and, if given sufficient warning, can alter the course of civilization to avoid the catastrophic consequences of present trends41 (even as our response to global climate change undermines that view). Science fiction films have presented a number of recurring themes, most prominent being dehumanization. We are losing our humanity to machines, political despots, drugs, computers, and so forth. Usually this dehumanization is deplored (loss of feeling, of emotion, and love), but occasionally this loss of humanity is applauded (where man leads a more “rational” and “scientific” life). Loss of individuality to a computer or rising technology is a common theme in post–World War II films. But much of the science fiction of the past is becoming science fact of the present or near future. In some respects, we have not heeded the warnings. Sometimes these warnings take on an “antiscience” flavor. The root of this antiscience attitude may rest in the fear that machines will one day take over most human functions, but the real heart of antiscientism comes from fears created by the rise of “the bomb.” Nuclear disaster has made antiscientism a legitimate science fiction topic. Living with the bomb for over seven decades has soured our vision of a brighter future based on technological and scientific advancements. Alien beings occasionally serve as a substitute for man-made invasions into the “normal” workings of society, and this allows for a wider range of possible consequences. These aliens can bring future technological advancements and place them in the world of today. We can suffer the future today. Concerned about the ever-spiraling arms race? We can see the future’s weapons today by introducing a creature from a “more advanced” civilization who have found a way to control the menace of advanced weaponry. Science fiction provides the filmmaker with wide creative leeway. A review of some of the more prominent political science fiction films may give us a better insight into the political significance of this type of film. Movies lend themselves to the fantasy and imagination of the science fiction story, and one of the early masters in this area was George Méliès. Originally a cartoonist, Méliès directed the creative A Trip to the Moon (1902, Le Voyage dans la Lune). Filled with space journeys, monsters, and bizarre landscapes,

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Méliès provided us with a playful and popular new film genre, and from that point on, science fiction stories transported us to new worlds. In 1919, Robert Wiene directed one of the most important and discussed films in the science fiction category: The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Creatively, this film far surpassed any of its predecessors. Caligari works at a fair as the “master” of a somnambulist named Cesare. A trail of murders (by Cesare) leads to Caligari who escapes into an insane asylum. When pursued into the asylum, it is revealed that the asylum’s director and Caligari are the same person. Investigators find out that the director had adopted Caligari’s identity and confront him with their evidence, whereupon he goes mad and is put into a straitjacket. Caligari represented, in Siegfried Kracauer’s words, “unlimited authority that idolizes power as such, and, to satisfy its lust for domination, ruthlessly violates all human rights and values.” Cesare represented the common man who, through no real fault of his own, is used as the instrument for cruel ends.42 Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927) is maybe the most extraordinary science fiction movie ever made. One of the more powerful futuristic warnings in film, Metropolis presents a horrifying version of a dehumanized, machine-dominated totalitarian state in which individualism is secondary to the power of the machine. Set in the year 2000, Lang presents a mechanized society where technology has gone mad. But the human slaves revolt in an attempt to recapture their humanity. Lang called his film “a horror tale of the future” and said that it shows “the desire to keep an individual an individual.” In the subterranean city of slave-workers, one girl, Maria, stands out. Preaching love, understanding, and human dignity, she attempts to lead a revolt against the machine-dominated society. But the master is determined to stop her and, to this end, creates a robot in her likeness: “we have made machines out of men, now I will make men out of machines—a robot indistinguishable from a real woman.”43 In the end, Lang’s warning of the future has a happy ending, where love wins out. But here is a prime example of science fiction presenting a dismal portrait for future generations. In 1936, William Cameron Menzies directed the British classic Things to Come. As the title signifies, we are once again given a warning that the future is not bright. Based on H. G. Wells’s screenplay, Things to Come was a warning to the world of the dangers of the impending world war. The film opens with a vision of Britain after years of war and destruction. The country is devastated. By 1970, order is restored in Everytown (where much of the film takes place). The town has been reduced to a near primitive state. Suddenly, to the surprise of everyone in town, a plane flies overhead.

Figure 4.4.  Metropolis, 1927 Source: Retro AdArchives, Alamy Stock Photo

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Planes were not seen in Everytown due to the lack of mechanics, materials, and fuel. The plane lands and Cabal (Raymond Massey) emerges. He announces that there is a Union of Scientists who will bring progress to the decaying world. “No more bosses,” Cabal says. Someone asks Cabal, “Who are you?” He answers, “The law and sanity.” He represented a group called Wings Over the World. What develops is a conflict between Wings Over the World (“We go on”) and the totalitarian state (“The state is mother, father, everything. I am master here; I am the state”), the people (“We”) versus the state (“I”). The film leaves a 1970 Britain with the conflict somewhat resolved and rejoins the world in 2036. Progress has been achieved, but the question is: “Does ‘progress’ make life better?” Just as there was a conflict in the earlier period, there is conflict in 2036. Now, it is Cabal who represents the state and Theotocopulos is the rebel artist. “I do not like this machine,” says Theotocopulos. “Well, what can we do about it?” asks another artist. “Talk,” is the answer. “I am going to talk all this machinery down.” But Cabal looks to the future and plans a trip to the moon in a spaceship. Cabal is asked, “Is there never to be rest?” “Rest enough for the individual,” says Cabal. “Too much of it and too soon, and we call it death. But for man, no rest and no ending. He must go on—conquest beyond conquest.”44 The spaceship is launched before Theotocopulous and his followers can stop it, and Cabal turns to his friend and asks, “All the universe—or nothing . . . which shall it be?” The picture fades away, and in a loud voice Cabal once again asks “Which shall it be?” Progress or stagnation? The future or the past? Remain satisfied or seek a better world? Indeed, the conflicts of today are quite similar to the conflicts in Things to Come. Be they environmental questions, conglomerate mergers, increased governmental control, or antivaccine protests, each day we are asked the question: which shall it be? Which shall it be? The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) represents a somewhat unusual approach to science fiction global politics. In the post–World War II period, a time in which we faced the realization that with the advent of nuclear weapons, another war can destroy the entire world, we begin to see a great interest in war and how to prevent it. The fear of nuclear annihilation was a growing concern among the public, and The Day the Earth Stood Still marks an attempt to warn the public of the danger of nuclear war. The unusual approach of the film is that the alien invader (Michael Rennie; Klaatu) rather than being the enemy, has come to earth to “save” mankind from itself, from nuclear madness. He has come to earth to show mankind how to limit their weapons and work for peace. Equipped with a robot called

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Figure 4.5.  The Day the Earth Stood Still, 1951 Source: Allstar Picture Library Ltd, Alamy Stock Photo

Gort, Klaatu threatens to destroy earth if mankind does not learn how to save itself. But Klaatu is treated as an enemy, and he is forced to impersonate an earthling in order to protect himself. As a human, Klaatu speaks out against “fear replacing reason.” Klaatu’s solution to earth’s nuclear madness is a robot police force which would serve as a super-power peacekeeper. This all-powerful robot corps would ensure that man would not “misbehave.” The robot police force was a symbol that if man could not stop himself, if man could not see the madness of the nuclear arms race, he would face either annihilation or fascist/totalitarian rule. The robots represent power. If reason rules man, he does not need this mindless power to dominate him. But will reason rule? The choice, the film suggests, is ours. Fascism or reason? The Day the Earth Stood Still is a political film which offers us a choice for the future. It challenged many of our “sacred cows” and was a powerful counteroffensive to the right-wing, anti-Communist scare film so prevalent at that time. Two of the more pronounced of the anti-communist science fiction films from the Cold War are The Red Planet (1952) and Invasion USA (1952). In Invasion USA, America is placed in a hypnotic trance. Once under this

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trance, the Russians begin a nuclear attack. This film calls for increased military strength and represents only a brief glimpse of the type of film which permeated America in the period of McCarthy hysteria. The anti-communist Senator Joseph McCarthy was a powerful force in the United States in the 1950s railing against alleged communists among us, and the movies reflected his right-wing hysteria. The cinematic response to the hysteria of the McCarthy era was Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). A number of social influences coalesced in the 1950s which created the need for a film such as Invasion: the McCarthy witch hunt, the Hollywood blacklist, a preoccupation with the “Red Menace,” fear of nuclear annihilation, and a growing sense of dehumanization. These forces produced alienation, demands for social conformity, fear of voicing one’s opinions, paranoia, and a loss of individuality. Invasion spoke to these growing concerns. The story takes place in a small town called Santa Maria. One by one, the citizens begin to realize that their relatives are no longer quite themselves. While they look and sound the same, “something” is different. It seems that alien pods have arrived, and they grow into the form of human beings. When the human sleeps, the pod takes over the body. These pod-people have no feelings, no emotions, no humanity. The lure of being a pod in the 1950s was all too powerful. But although dangling the carrot of conformity, Invasion opts ultimately for the stick of painful individuality. The possibility of moral uncertainty was the price we must pay for continued freedom. Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) discovers that pod-ism is taking over the town and tries to fight its spread. But it appears to be a losing battle. Pod-ism grows. He finally escapes the pursuit of the pods and is able to warn the authorities of the approaching danger. There were several political problems attached to the making of this film. After previewing the film, executives for Allied Artists forced a change. Director Don Siegal and screenwriter Daniel Mainwaring were “required” to add a prologue and epilogue to the film. The original version ended on a pessimistic note, with Miles running down a highway, unable to get any of the passing motorists to listen to his warning. The conclusion finds Miles shouting into the camera, “You’re next!” But in the Hollywood world of happy endings, this could not be tolerated. Thus, a prologue and epilogue were added which both simplified the plot and gave the story a happy ending: Miles’s story is believed, and we suspect the world will be saved. Prologues and epilogues aside, Invasion of the Body Snatchers is much more than a science fiction film. It is an attack on the dual dangers of McCarthyism and the mindless conformity which was on the rise in the

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1950s. Siegel reveals these evils growing in America, and in the film, Miles refers to pod-ism saying, “It’s a malignant disease spreading through the whole country.” Pod-ism is merely a euphemism. Americans were going to sleep and becoming mindless, emotionless pods. As Siegel said, “I think that the world is populated by pods, and I wanted to show them.” The “you’re next!” warning was aimed at America. Be careful or you too will become pod. The solution, according to Miles, is to fight: “Only when we have to fight to stay human do we realize how precious our humanity is.” The message is that we must fight for our humanity, or else we lose ourselves to pod-ism.45 Both directly and indirectly, Invasion of the Body Snatchers dealt with the most compelling social problems of the 1950s. It spoke to the emerging fears of a generation facing nuclear annihilation, fear of political oppression, social conformity, and dehumanization. Invasion was a warning. TERRORISM While terrorism has a long history, for the West, it took the attack against the United States on September 11, 2001, to serve as the wake-up-call to the surge of terrorism and make it a central focus of public attention and fear. The movie industry was late to arrive on this topic. As most terrorist acts took place “over there,” the subject was not central to most US citizens. Yes, there were a few movies about airplane hijackings, a few more about political fanatics, but overall, it was a subject largely ignored. A notable exception is The Battle of Algiers (1966), considered by many to be the greatest political film of all time. The movie—filmed in quasi-documentary form—deals with the independence movement in Algeria. As one of France’s colonies, Algeria, like so many nations in the post–World War II era, demanded independence. The French were determined to hold onto its colony and sent in troops to crush the rebellion. What is odd about the film is that it does not display the customary contempt for the non-western characters in the film. Likewise, it shuns the good guy versus bad guy approach, with the French portrayed as brutal thugs and the Algerians as innocent victims. Instead, Algiers takes a hard, even brutal, look at violence and revolutions in which horrible acts are done by both sides. Plus, the French military officer Colonel Mathieu is presented not as an evil monster, but as a heroic figure who fought against the Nazis in World War II. While the “bad guy” is usually presented as the embodiment of evil (see Z), here an honorable man is asked to do unsavory things (e.g., torture prisoners). The “good guys,” here, the Algerian rebels, are not pure. In fact, in one of the most dramatic and horrific scenes of the film, the revolutionaries plant bombs

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in several places around the city, places frequented by everyday French people. It is a ticking time bomb, literally waiting to go off, and we wait with it, dreading the thought that the cute little innocent French boy licking an ice cream cone is about to be blown to smithereens. Gillo Pontecorno, the film’s director, presents a more realistic portrait of the horrors both sides engage in during war, and spares neither side. Each demonstrates some admirable qualities, yet each side “must” also engage in truly horrifying acts. The audience is given a choice, root for one or the other, but know that both sides are “unclean” This is a stark contrast to the typical Hollywood-style political film that decides for the audience who the good guy is and who the bad guy is. The bad guy is all bad; the good guy embodies all that is good. The viewer must side with the filmmakers’ preferences. No thinking allowed. In pre-9/11 America, one film seemed to anticipate events to come. The Siege (1998) presents New York City as the victim of several terrorist attacks. Local law enforcement, the FBI, the US military, and the CIA all get involved, competing for turf and toughness. The enemy—Arab terrorists—are smart, ruthless, and determined. To find them and stop them, US agents break the rules and engage in illegal activities—all in the name of defending America. But FBI agent Anthony Habbard (Denzel Washington) does the right thing in the right way. He tries to respect human rights, civil liberties, and the rule of law. In the end, our “hero” wins the day, and the United States stops the evil terrorists by upholding our most cherished values. Lamentably, after 9/11, the United States sometimes failed to uphold those values and engaged in serial violations of civil rights and liberties, engaged in torture (referred to as “enhanced interrogation”), forced renditions, and other abuses of power. The Hollywood ending is the story we want to believe (or insist on believing), but the political reality was far different. CORRUPTION Is America a corrupt and venal society? Is our government little more than a kleptocracy or a “swamp”? Overall, movies have taken a rather cynical view of US politics and government. Yes, there are a celebratory movies, but good stories and good drama set one side off against another; good versus evil; the common man versus the rich businessman; the little guy versus the system. And making “the system” the bad guy allows for the celebration of the heroic individual to go up against the odds and defeat the corrupt system. It is the story we want to, perhaps need to, believe to maintain some level of support for the status quo. Yes, the system may at times be corrupt or led by corrupt

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individuals, but the common man can rise up and against the odds and win the day for truth and justice. It is the story we hunger for. A recurrent theme in the films of director Frank Capra is a common man confronting (and defeating) the powerful, well-financed, corrupt politician or business mogul. Most of us grew up believing in the America of the dignity of the average man, of truth and justice, honesty, democracy, and decency. It is the America of neighborhoods, friends, family, and good triumphing over evil. Frank Capra’s works embodied the American dream and the American myth. Our “story” plays out beautifully in the films of Capra. He is the America we wish existed. Capra got into the movie business in the mid-twenties, and it wasn’t long before he moved to the forefront. In spite of his rise to fame, Capra never forgot his humble beginnings, and his films were, in effect, glorifications of the common man and middle-class virtues, optimism and the “never-give up” attitude. Capra’s recurring theme involved a confrontation between good and evil, or probity and corruption. The bad guys were rich, sophisticated urban hustles: lawyers, tycoons, political bosses, bankers, and businessmen. They were concerned with power and money. They were venal and corrupt. The good guys were idealistic, simple young men: plain everyday Americans. The battle between good and evil was fought within the boundaries of the American system. To Capra, the system was essentially good. But when the unscrupulous power and money brokers employ their corrupt practices to gain control, in steps our hero. With only goodness and truth on his side, he marches in and, because the system—and “the people”—are good, our hero triumphs. Goodness wins over evil. This recurring theme was recounted by Capra himself in his autobiography The Name Above the Title, as: A simple honest man, driven into a corner by predatory sophisticates, can, if he will, reach down into his god-given resources and come up with the necessary handfuls of courage, wit, and love to triumph over his environment.46

The Capra hero was the American Everyman. They were not “exceptional” or highly accomplished in conventional terms. They were small-town America. They were the composite of Jefferson, Lincoln, and Thoreau; they were an idea type; they were “the common man.” Speaking of the “common man as hero” theme, Capra once said, “the common man idea, I didn’t think he was common, I thought he was a hell of a guy. I thought he was the hope of the world.”47 Capra also said that “the people are right. People’s instincts are good, never bad.”48 Capra’s little men could save the world from the corrupt

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bosses and crooked tycoons if only they could (or would) join forces. “We’re the people and we’re tough,” says one of Capra’s characters, John Doe. “A free people can beat the world at anything . . . if we all pulled the oars in the same direction.” As Capra has written: How powerful is the quality of honesty! Honest men, of any color or tongue, are trusted and loved. They attract others like magnets attracting iron filings. An honest man carries with him his own aura, crown, army, wealth, happiness, and social standing. He carries them all in the noblest of all titles: an honest man.49

Capra’s vision, or story, of America and the American hero can be seen in a number of his prominent films. In Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936), the hero, Longfellow Deeds (Gary Cooper) is a simple, honest, small-town man who inherits 520 million dollars from an uncle he has never met. Deeds leaves the small town for the big city where the forces of evil attempt to control him and his money. Living in a mansion, Deeds begins to lose touch until an out-of-work farmer breaks into his mansion and, waving a pistol, threatens to kill Deeds. Shaken up by this, Deeds decides to help his fellow man by using his money to buy small farms and give them to the needy. Deeds’s corrupt lawyers then go to work attempting to have Deeds declared insane. During a court hearing, Deeds is unwilling to defend himself. The shysters appear to be winning, but finally Deeds stands up and, with the help of “the little people” in the courtroom, is declared sane. All is well, the good guy wins, the bad guys lose. And the system belongs to the people. Deeds is not a typical political hero. As Gerald Mast writes, “The hero of this political film is a most apolitical guy who had only one political belief: some folks are ‘just swell’ and other folks ain’t.”50 But in spite of this, Deeds beat the sophisticates in what would appear to be their own den. Goodness is the key. In America, goodness triumphs—no matter what the odds. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939) starring Jimmy Stewart as Jefferson Smith, once again portrays a hero of small-town virtue who is appointed to fill an unexpired term in the US Senate. The Taylor political machine that controls Smith’s state is sure that the bumbling Smith will “follow orders,” and for a time, Jefferson simply bumbles his way through the Senate. But Smith gets an idea for a youth camp, which, it so happens, he wants to build on land for which the corrupt political bosses have other plans. The pols try to frame Smith, and—as was the case with Mr. Deeds—it looks as if they will win. But Jefferson Smith refuses to give in—he has goodness on his side. Smith begins an exhausting talking filibuster and, at the point when he is ready to drop from exhaustion, Senator Paine (one of Taylor’s cronies) bursts

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into the Senate chamber after, we are led to believe, a failed suicide attempt, and clears Jefferson Smith. A familiar theme, a familiar conclusion. The naïve young innocent is bullied by evil men, evil begins to win, but in the end goodness triumphs. The system is essentially sound. It’s just that “a few rotten apples” are spoiling the institution. If only we could elect “the right people” all would be well. The goodness of the common man, and the goodness of the American system are never in doubt. In Meet John Doe (1941), Capra begins to shift his emphasis a bit. Faced with the rise of fascism abroad, Capra, who had previously boosted the American spirit in the midst of an economic depression and would produce the pro–United States Why We Fight series boosting morale during World War II, seemed to have difficulty deciding just how to respond to the rise of fascism. If Capra’s previous films were dominated by a wide-eyed faith in the American system, Meet John Doe is a vision of a darker side of America. Meet John Doe involves a newspaper scheme in which a fake “John Doe” fakes a suicide note sent to the newspaper. The note attracts attention, and Ann Mitchell (Barbara Stanwyck), the creator of the letter, sets out to find someone to play the part. After a lengthy search she settles on Long John Willoughby (Gary Cooper), an aspiring baseball pitcher in need of an arm operation. The John Doe scheme captures the public’s attention and millionaire D. B. Norton—a fascist-like character—plans to use John Doe in his rise to power. John Doe begins to speak to the problems of the common man, and “John Doe Clubs” spring up all across America. Finally, a John Doe convention is planned, and here D. B. Norton decides it is time to take over. Having financed the John Doe movement, now Norton demands that Long John choose Norton as the John Doe candidate for president. Long John refuses and plans to tell the convention of Norton’s unscrupulous plan. But before Willoughby can do so, Norton himself rushes to the microphone and reveals that Willoughby is a fake. The crowd turns against Willoughby, becomes a violent mob, and Long John barely escapes. In a state of depression, Long John decides that he will—as the original John Doe letter states—commit suicide on Christmas Eve. As Long John moves toward the ledge of a tall building, a group of John Does intercede and convince Long John that he should not jump. The film ends (five different endings were shot) with no real resolution. The film was, in fact, a brutal, depressing portrait of America. It presents a pessimistic picture of idealism and man’s inability to see through the phony power brokers. Also, Meet John Doe seems to Americanize fascism. It portrays a public that can easily be manipulated by the powerbrokers. The public, this film would have us believe, can be turned into a mob, and if a political leader

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comes up with the right gimmick, the public may follow. In trying to go against fascism, Capra paints a picture of how a Fascist or other political authoritarian might assume power in America. While Capra intended this film to fit into his “good versus evil” formula, a darker conflict resulted from his ambivalence. The John Doe club was a gimmick. It worked. Other unscrupulous public figures have likewise turned to gimmicks to rise to power: Joseph McCarthy with his anti-Communist witch hunts is but one example. Capra, in a sense, has paved the way for such cynics and hate-mongers to rise to power through the clever use of symbols and stories presented through the media. It was not Capra’s intent to foster these types of movements, but in Meet John Doe, the example was presented as to just how these political and social movements might become successful. As film critic Andrew Sarris writes in The American Cinema: With Meet John Doe, Frank Capra crossed the thin line between populist sentimentality and populist demagoguery. Capra’s political films—Meet John Doe, You Can’t Take It with You, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington—had always implied a belief in the tyranny of the majority, but John Doe embodied in Gary Cooper a barefoot fascist, suspicious of all ideas and all doctrines, but believing in the innate conformism of the common man.51

And as Richard Glatzer writes: What began as Capra’s denouncement of Nazi tactics finds the seeds of Fascism lying dormant in American Democracy. Meet John Doe presents America, not with the good self-image that Deeds and Smith provided, but with the underside of that image with all of Capra’s doubts about democracy and the American people.52

The Second World War interrupted Capra’s commercial film career, but he did continue to make films. Capra directed a series of American propaganda films called the Why We Fight series. After the war, Capra returned to commercial filmmaking and began to shift away from clearly political films to a more personal, fantasized type of film. This new emphasis is best seen in Capra’s 1946 classic, It’s a Wonderful Life. The film focuses on the life of George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart). George grew up in Bedford Falls, dreaming of leaving. But events conspired to force George to stay in this small town, and George grew up helping his neighbors, the poor, and the needy. Finally, in a state of disillusionment, George concludes that leading a “good” life and helping others has left little time for George and his dreams. He wished he were never born and goes to a bridge

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to commit suicide. But an angel intervenes and grants George his wish—a vision of a world in which George Bailey was never born. A Bedford Falls without George Bailey is a horror story in which old man Potter (Lionel Barrymore), the town banker, runs things with an iron and cruel hand. George realizes just how many lives he has touched and how important he is, and decides to go on living. Human values once again win out over material values. Capra is the archetypical American filmmaker. His political views do not reflect any clear-cut consistent political philosophy, but a glorification of being “swell” tempered with a strong dose of anti-intellectualism as when Mr. Deeds refuses an opera board request for $100,000 to cover losses saying that if the opera was longing money “there must be something wrong.” Capra represents another deep-seated aspect of the American story. Below its self-congratulatory “swellness” lies a darker underbelly. Self-doubt and contradiction are also a part of the American story, and Capra brings these attributes to light, often with some brutality. Behind the optimistic and uplifting fables are stories of depression and suicide, pain and despair. His endings may celebrate virtue, but the body of his work portrays America as naive and its political system as corrupt. When faced with this vision, his heroes often contemplate suicide or exhibit self-destructive tendencies (Mr. Deeds, John Doe, George Bailey). But the common man as hero rises above these feelings and goes on— against all odds—to beat those forces that have all the weapons, all except goodness. An average citizen, armed only with truth and goodness can, Capra tells us, defeat the elites who control society. Is it a false premise that Capra offers? Is it giving the “little man” hope where little exists? It tells the common man to be a good citizen and don’t envy the wealthy because poverty equals goodness and wealth equals corruption. It is, in effect, an opium for the masses, an emotional justification for “getting dumped on.” Who benefits from this story? While Capra’s common man heroes win, real life gives the lone individual (no matter how “swell” he is) little chance against the huge conglomerates that dictate policy today. But the Capra film is a part of the national self-image. He may not have created America, but he captured its essence and embodied its beliefs and story. ENVIRONMENTALISM There was a time when environmental problems could be solved largely at the local level. The factory on the outskirts of town was dumping dangerous chemicals in the river upstream from the town and the drinking water in the

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river became poisonous to the public, so local officials might approach the factory owner and first ask, then perhaps compel the owner to cease from polluting the river. In the 1970s, environmental issues became national and clean air, clean water, and pollution regulation was passed by Congress, and governmental agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) were created. Today, pollution does not respect national borders, and our environmental problems can no longer be solved by individual nations. Now, international agreements and global cooperation are necessary if we are to confront global environmental and climate problems. What is the best way to reach an audience? What method of filmmaking is most powerful in its impact on viewers? Is a documentary approach better than a dramatic story? If storytelling is of as much value as this book maintains, a good story, well told, might be the best way. The 2006 Academy award-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth is a powerful warning about the dangers of climate change. Featuring former vice president Al Gore, the film raised awareness regarding the damage being done to the environment and called for swift action to reverse this crisis. With state-of-the-art graphics and narration by Gore, the viewer is presented with a compelling case. But are viewers impacted? Do they continue to think about the film’s message? Are minds changed or activism sparked? Contrast An Inconvenient Truth to the 2009 blockbuster Avatar. This science fiction film takes place in 2154 when the earth’s national resources have been depleted, causing a severe energy shortage. Pandora, a moon orbiting Polyphemus, seems to offer some hope, so Na’vi—human, blue-skinned avatars—are employed to explore Pandora’s biosphere. Amid the efforts to sort out the expedition, conflicts ensue, and things begin to deteriorate, finally getting to the point where the order is given to destroy Hometree on Pandora. But fears are raised that destroying Hometree might damage the national environment of Pandora. Regardless, the attack commences. Later, a battle ensues on Pandora with the humans attacking the Na’vi avatars. But arriving to save the day, a collection of Pandora’s wildlife joins the fight to protect their habitat. They crush the humans. Avatar is a film with a purpose. It presents a pro-ecology viewpoint, and draws viewers in. It dramatizes environmental issues by using human and avatar figures to personalize the issues and present a deeply affecting drama. The story hits us. We root for the good guys, the ones not exploiting others or the environment. So which approach works best? I would argue that while both movies are extremely well-made, and of award-winning quality, more people want to see Avatar, and more people are likely to be moved, drawn in, affected by the

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story-led drama. We simply relate more easily and more naturally to stories. The “preachiness” is enveloped in a compelling story. We digest it better. CONCLUSION Movies have the capability of transcending national boundaries. People all over the world can learn through movies not necessarily what America is like, but what movies make America look like. Movie stars are more recognizable than most political leaders, and more people attend movies than political rallies and meetings. Movies are all around us, and we are affected by them. Movies give us common experiences—we share the same stimuli, often the same talking points. They have the capacity to bring about what William Hocking calls “civilization in the singular.” We are exposed to a single, common “attention frame,” and this may have a common effect upon us. The significance of these common shared stories and experiences is yet to be fully understood, and there are many conflicts in the images presented (some liberal, some conservative), but we are being exposed to many common forms of stimulation, and these shared experiences do something “to us.” As historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., writes: The American movie has provided a common dream life, a common fund of reference and fantasy, to a society divided by ethnic distinctions and economic disparities. At the same time, it may well have excited and even incited the oppressed by displaying the abundance presumably available to their masters. One may guess that movies have generated as much discontent as they have acquiescence.53

And Max Lerner has written in his study America as a Civilization: Never in history has so great an industry as the movies been so nakedly and directly built out of the dreams of a people. Any hour of the day or the evening you can go into a darkened theater . . . and as the figures move across the screen you sail off on storm-tossed seas of sex, action, and violence, crime, and death. . . . When you come home to sleep, your dreams are woven around the symbols which themselves have been woven out of your dreams, for the movies are the stuff American dreams are made of.54

Movies can extend our experiences. We may vicariously take part in any number of human activities. Through movies we can “escape” into other worlds, other experiences, other lifestyles. While we normally view “escape” as a derogatory activity, it is not necessarily a bad thing. As anthropologist Hortense Powermaker writes:

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Escape, per se, is neither good nor bad. All forms of art offer some kind of escape, and it may well be that escape is a necessary part of living. The real question is the quality of what one escapes into. One can escape into a world of imagination and come from it refreshed and with new understanding. One can expand limited experiences into broad ones. One can escape into saccharine sentimentality or into fantasies which exaggerate existing fears. Hollywood provides ready-made fantasies or daydreams; the problem is whether these are productive or nonproductive; whether the audience is psychologically enriched or impoverished.55

Indeed, the question is the quality of the escape. Do movies enrich or impoverish? Do the political messages contained in films help make us slaves to the state or do they help liberate us? Do they educate and enlighten, or do they numb our senses? Films can be influential in both a positive and a negative way. The way “reality,” or the story, is portrayed in film may influence the way we view the world around us, thus the images on the screen may help shape our perception of the world around us. If films tend to portray certain types of people in consistent and repeated ways, this image may become our view of reality. In this respect, the way political ideas are portrayed in films can be quite important. For example, Hollywood films have never been very kind in portraying politicians. Rarely are they pictured as decent, honorable men intent on doing good. Rather, as film scholar Rob Edelman writes, “throughout its brief history, Hollywood had consistently depicted politicians as either ruthless, gutless scoundrels or pompous, bumbling idiots concerned not with serving their constituents but with mouthing meaningless rhetoric, making deals to get elected or obtaining the fast buck.”56 Those who say that a movie is no place for a political statement suggest that a theater is a place for “dreaming, not learning.” Maybe so, but in our dreams are revealed a good deal about who we are, what we want, and what we wish to be. Our dreams are a part of us, and those dreams reveal a truth which is important. Movies cannot long avoid presenting stories of social significance, for such matters are at the core of drama and human existence. The stories in films have a long and deep reach. They matter because movies matter to us. A good story reaches as well as teaches. To a public accustomed to thinking of movies almost exclusively as a form of entertainment, it may be difficult to reorient thinking toward the social and political content of film. But as film and television become more and more a part of our lives, understanding their effects upon the public will take on increasing importance. If we continue to absorb the input from the media without discriminating between the worthwhile and the worthless, true and untrue, we fall victim to whatever messages are presented to us. Therefore, if

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the viewer is to rationally decide on the value of film content, they must be aware of the ways in which film influences attitudes and behavior. Movies are entertainment, art, and politics. They contain social and political messages which the viewer receives (either consciously or unconsciously). In this sense, movies can be considered as “hidden persuaders.” They convey messages, but not always (or even usually) in an obvious way. Movies normally convey messages in a subtle way. This is why it is important for us to be aware of the political role of movies. Perhaps films can’t “educate” but they can help shape the terms of debate or highlight (and ignore) certain issues. Look at the influence that Roots (1977) had when it was aired on television or the impact of Citizen Kane on thousands upon thousands of moviegoers. Movies can, and do, influence us. And as technological advances continue, films and new forms of social media will become more important as hidden persuaders, informers, and propagandizers. NOTES 1. Yannis Tziomakis and Claire Molloy, The Routledge Companion to Cinema and Politics (Routledge, 2016). 2. Quoted in Baxter Phillips, Swastika: Cinema of Oppression (Warner Books, 1976), 97. 3. See Richard P. Adler, “What Is Visual Literacy?” American Film 8, no. 8 (June 1978). 4. Philip L. Gianos, Politics and Politicians in America Film (Praeger, 1998); Daniel P. Franklin, Politics and Film, Zal edition (Rowman and Littlefield, 2017); Michael Coyne, Hollywood Goes to Washington (Reaktion Books, 2008); and Elizabeth Haas, Terry Christensen, and Peter J. Haas, Projecting Politics: Political Messages in American Films, 2nd edition (Routledge, 2015). 5. See: Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death (Penguin, 2005). 6. Michael Haas, ed., Hollywood Raises Political Consciousness (Peter Lang, 2014), 2. 7. Studies concerning the link between films and behavior have been slow to emerge. One attempt can be seen in the works dealing with film in Germany. The relationship between the films of pre-Nazi and Nazi Germany, and public attitudes is presented in Siegfried Kracauer, From Caligari to Hitler (Princeton, 1974); and David S. Hull, Film in the Third Reich (Simon and Schuster, 1973). Also see, Michael A. Genovese, “Teaching about Fascisim with Film,” NEWS for Teachers of Political Science, Spring 1984. 8. Quoted in Michael Wood, “The True Story of ‘Star Wars’: The Myths Strike Back,” Los Angeles Times, 17 Aug. 1980, part V, p. 3. 9. Ibid.

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10. See: Mark Sachleben and Kevan M. Yenerall, Seeing the Bigger Picture: American and International Politics in Film and Popular Culture (Peter Lang, 2012). 11. Quoted in Yale Udoff, “Cinematic Politics,” Film Comment 2, no. 2 (1964), p. 37. 12. See: Mark Sachleben and Kevan M. Yenerall, Seeing the Bigger Picture: American and International Politics in Film and Popular Culture (Peter Lang, 2012). 13. Quoted in James Monaco, “The Costa-Gavras Syndrome,” Cineaste 8, no. 2 (1976), p. 20. 14. “Camera Three,” CBS-TV, June 4, 1976. 15. Ibid. 16. Andrew Bergman, We’re in the Money: Depression America and Its Films (Harper, 1971), xvi. 17. John Baxter, The Cinema of John Ford (Barnes, 1971), 11. 18. Joseph McBride and Michael Wilmington, John Ford (DaCapo Press, 1975), 85–86. 19. Andrew Sarris, The John Ford Movie Mystery (Indiana University Press, 1975), 180. 20. Jack Beatty, review of Andrew Sinclair’s John Ford, The New Republic, March 31, 1979, p. 34. 21. Bernard F. Dick, Anatomy of Film (St. Martin’s Press, 1978). 22. Gerald Mast, A Short History of the Movies (Bobbs-Merril, 1976), 181. 23. Andrew Bergman, We’re in the Money: Depression America and Its Films (Harper and Row, 1971), 35. 24. Ibid. p. 36. 25. Quoted in Roger Manvelle, Chaplin (Little Brown Company, 1974), 182. 26. Charles Chaplin, My Autobiography (Simon & Schuster, 1964), 399–400. 27. George Bernard Shaw, Major Barbara (Dover Publications, 2002). 28. Q&A at the American Film Institute 1979 29. See: Thomas E. Cronin, Michael A. Genovese, and Meena Bose, The Paradox of the American Presidency, 6th edition (Oxford University Press, 202l); and Michael A. Genovese, POTUS (Columbia University Press, 2022). 30. See: Mark Sachleben and Kevan M. Yenerall, Seeing the Big Pictures (Peter Lang, 2006), 97. 31. Daniel J. Leab, From Sambo to Supersade: The Black Experience in Motion Pictures (Houghton Mifflin, 1973), 1. 32. Monaco, American Film Now, 186–87. 33. Sidney Poitier, “Walking the Hollywood Color Line,” American Film, April 1980, p. 267. 34. Molly Haskell, From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies (Penguin, 1973), 1. 35. Andrew Bergman, We’re in the Money (Harper and Row, 1971), 50. 36. Sarah Hagelin and Gillian Silverman, The New Female Anti-Hero: The Disruptive Women of Twenty-First Century US Television (University of Chicago Press, 2022).

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37. See: Michael A. Genovese and Janice Steckenrider, Women as Political Leaders (Routledge, 2013). 38. The musical soundtrack of Atomic Blonde is simply outstanding, featuring songs by David Bowie, Nena, Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Clash, and ’Till Tuesday (featuring Aimee Mann). 39. See: Jennifer M. Ramos, Changing Norms Through Actions: The Evolution of Sovereignty (Oxford University Press, 2013). 40. Cynthia Weber, International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction (Routledge, 2013). 41. Jutta Weldes, To Seek Out New Worlds: Exploring Links between Science Fiction and World Politics (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003). 42. Siegfried Kracauer, From Caligari to Hitler: A Pathological History of the German Film (Princeton University Press, 2019). 43. Thea Von Harbou, Metropolis (Dover, 2011). 44. H.G. Wells, The Shape of Things to Come (Gateway, 2017). 45. Stuart Samuels, “The Age of Conspiracy and Conformity: Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” in John E. O’Connor and Martin A. Jackson, eds., American History/ American Film (New York: Ungar, 1979), 212. 46. Frank Capra, The Name Above the Title (Macmillan, 1971), 186. 47. Geoffrey Hellman, “Thinker in Hollywood,” The New Yorker, Feb. 24, 1940, pp. 23–24. 48. Interview with Steve Mamber, “Frank Capra, One Man—One Film,” American Film Institute (Discussion 3, 1971). 49. Capra, The Name Above the Title, 182. 50. Gerald Mast, “Wintergreen for President,” The New Republic, March 6, 1976, p. 19. 51. Andrew Sarris, The American Cinema (Dutton, 1968), 87. 52. Richard Glatzer, “Meet John Doe: An End to Social Mythmaking,” in Raeburn, ed., Frank Capra: The Man and His Films (University of Michigan Press, 1975), 146. 53. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., foreword to John E. O’Connor and Martin A. Jackson, American History, American Film: Interpreting the Hollywood Image (Ungar, 1979), xii. 54. Max Lerner, America as a Civilization (Simon & Schuster, 1957), 820. 55. Hortense Powermaker, Hollywood the Dream Factory (Little, Brown & Company, 1950), 12–13. 56. Rob Edelman, “The Politician in Film,” Film in Review, Nov. 1976, p. 531.

Conclusion

Opportunities to tell stories abound. Stories can comprise the collective memory of a person, group, religion, or nation. We are drawn to stories, need stories to provide meaning and place in a world of chaos and confusion. Stories help define our reality. Who are we, where do we fit in? Stories can place us within a larger social and political context. They help us belong. I am male, older, white, and American. The full range of meanings derived from those facts help make me who I am, and the “who” I am has been impacted by the stories of my life. The stories in my head—of Micky Mantle striding to the plate, John Kennedy being struck down in Dallas, Martin Luther King Jr. and then Bobby Kennedy being assassinated, of James Bond (Sean Connery) and his ultra-cool style of expressing manhood, of marches against the war in Vietnam, of the Cold War and its end, of 9/11—all reside within me. The stories in my head may not all be true. Some are exaggerations (my exploits on the baseball field, for example), others driven from my memory, some are old stories that pain me still, others never fail to evoke a smile. I see my life in my stories. Throughout history, we humans have found ways to share our stories. The oral tradition with men sitting around a fire, telling stories of heroic adventures, the cave paintings of our ancient ancestors, the parables from the Bible, the great paintings, photographs, music, the movies all tell our stories. If we unmask the power of stories, take a deep dive into their meaning, their influence, their hold on us, we will delve deeper into ourselves, see why we need stories, unpack their hold over us. Do these stories shape us or do we create the stories we need? “Tell me a story,” a six-year-old said to his dad who was too busy to oblige. Is that a “true” story, or only the story in my head. And does it matter? It is important for us to see and understand the role and impact stories or narratives have in our lives. Stories enrich and educate. They can also mislead and endanger us. 155

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Our brains hunger for stories. Stories make it easier to process complex ideas and help us navigate life’s complexities. From the fairy tales we grew up with to the movies we watch, stories are in our heads. And while not wishing to leave the reader on a sour note, we must remember also about the downside of stories: the dangers they can pose and the illadvised roads down which they can lead us. Some stories glamorize sexism, racism, or violence and may thereby make us more prone to engage in violent or dysfunctional behavior. Movies such as Saw (2004), and Hostel (2005), may normalize violence and cruelty and make us immune to social taboos against bad behavior. And some of the stories with which we grew up may have taught negative lessons. What, for example, was the impact on girls growing up, of stories like Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, or The Little Mermaid? Did girls learn that they should wait for a Prince Charming to arrive and save them? Did these stories teach helplessness and weakness? Did they convey the message that you needed a man to become fulfilled? This helplessness may have made woman more passive, more deferential to men, less willing to take risks on the road to fulfillment. Not all the stories in our heads have a positive impact. The stories of our childhood stay with us, even today. Dr. Seuss’s The Lorax (on environmentalism), Matilda by Roald Dahl (on the love of books), Watty Piper’s The Little Train That Could (or believing and giving it your all), Elmer by David McKee (on accepting differences), and Have You Filled Your Bucket Today? by Carol McCloud (on kindness) taught us (or might have taught us) valuable lessons about ourselves and life. Classic works, parables, such as The Boy Who Cried Wolf, The Sky Is Falling, The Proud Rose, King Midas and the “Golden Touch,” and Pinocchio offer timeless lessons about key values. The child is father to the man; the books and fables of our youth helped make us who and what we are today. The stories of our life mattered. Stories are stories are stories. These narratives in our heads unconsciously affect our behavior. The key is what the stories make of us, and what we make of the stories. Are we masters or victims of these stories? Do we have the capacity to master form and content or are we easily led, easily manipulated? Stories so powerfully drew us in that we may not easily see that we are being manipulated. Are we so malleable that the story dictates, or can we “decide”? Mastering the story is a key in mastering our environment. Allow me to end with a story. Why did I become a college professor? I could have played centerfield for the New York Yankees, been the leader of a rock’n’roll band, or a movie star (the George Clooney of my era), or author of the Great American novel. But I chose to become a professor. And many factors went into my decision, but a story kept playing in my head, a story that obviously mattered to me. It was the story of the myth of America.

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IMPLICATIONS FOR DEMOCRACY In the history of the world, democracies are a rarity. Few have lasted, and while the post-1990 period seemed like a victory for democracy, by the early twenty-first century, democracies were on the defensive, challenged from within by illiberal leaders, and form without by authoritarians. Democracy demands an engaged, aware public. From the outset, democracies required rational citizens. But as this book makes clear, the human brain does not always engage in the due diligence required to produce rational thinking. We are susceptible to cognitive biases and sometimes victims of misdirection and manipulation. Hopefully, this book will help you discern how the stories we hear influence us and get into our brains to take us on a journey of the story’s path. This may lead us away from rational thought, and into the realm of the irrational. Stories make a kind of sense to our brains; they take us away. But democracy needs us to be grounded in evidence, information, rigorous testing of propositions. We cannot have a properly functioning democracy without a rational citizenry. Ours is to enjoy stories, not be their slaves. And yet, the power of stories can take over. Unless we are aware of how this happens, we will be susceptible to the chasm, the influence, and the sheer power of stories. But reason and rationality must prevail. Enlightened reason is our goal. We cannot have a true democracy without it. As a child, my parents and teachers told me the story of America, of the founders, of the grand idea that animated the Revolutionary War. Freedom, justice, equality, democracy, ideas that sounded so grand, so important, so inspiring. I bought it, hook, line and sinker. Those ideas became my ideas. Those stories became my stories. When I got to college (late 1960s), those ideas were tested by the war in Vietnam. I came to believe that my country—the country of those childhood stories—was either a fraud or, more likely, had grievously erred, and was not living up to its stated ideals and aspirations. That gap between the ideal and the real, between what I deeply believed, was taught to believe, and what I was seeing, was a gulf of huge proportions. This caused great discomfort and confusion which then translated into anger. I joined the anti-war movement; became a campus leader, and I became more and more interested in how my country could have gone so far astray. It was an academic interest, but it was also quite personal. I studied US foreign policy, international relations, Richard Nixon, and the presidency. I was determined to answer the question that haunted me: who was Richard Nixon? And as I commenced my academic career, I taught and wrote about Nixon. I also focused my academic career around understanding the US presidency,

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and political leadership more broadly defined. And so, the story, the story of America that I had learned and embraced, is directly connected to the story of my life. Yes, for me, stories mattered. I am sure your stories mattered to you as well. The lesson of this book? If you want to change the world, you have to change the narrative.

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Index

Page references for figures are italicized. Abu Ghraib, 43, 45, 58 Adams, Eddie, 41 Adams, John Quincy, 17 Air Force 1, 128 Allegory of Good and Bad Government, 47 Allegory of Prudence, 47 American Dream, 25 “American Idiot,” 67 The American President, 128–29 The Apotheosis of Washington, 59 Arab Spring, 67 Aristophanes, 44 Atomic Blonde, 134 Avatar, 148–49 Banksy, 62 The Battle of Algiers, 141–42 The Beatles, 70–72, 73, 87 Beethoven, 67–68 Being There, 101 Bergman, Andrew, 98 Berlin, Irving, 74 Bible, 17 Biden, Joe, 7, 10 Birth of a Nation, 129–30 Black Panther, 27

Bloom, Allan, 70 Bob Roberts, 103–4 Bond, James, 31 Bono, 67 Bowling Alone, 2, 61 Boyz N the Hood, 131 Brooks, Peter, 15 Brown, James, 84 Bruner, Jerome, 15 Buffalo Springfield, 67 Bush, George H. W., 15 Bush, George W., 11, 23, 43, 86 The Caine Mutiny, 123–24 Cameron, James, 13 Campbell, Joseph, 16 Capra, Frank, 96, 100, 143–47 Carlos, John, 41, 43 Cash, Johnny, 85 Christ, Jesus, 1, 45, 50–51 Christ’s Entry into Brussels in 1889, 50 Citizen Kane, 108–11, 109 Clinton, Bill, 23, 102 Clinton, Hillary, 9, 102 Conal, Robbie, 62 Connery, Sean, 31 The Consequences of War, 51, 54 165

166

Costa-Gavras, 96, 125–26 COVID-19, 4 Cron, Lisa, 19 culture, 33 Daumier, Honoré, 58 David, Louis, 49 The Day the Earth Stood Still, 138–39, 139 De Goya, Francisco, 51, 52 Delacroix, Eugene, 48–49 democracy, 26, 28, 48, 50–51, 97, 99, 118, 143 DiMaggio, Joe, 1 Dixie Chicks, 67, 86 Do the Right Thing, 131 Dr. Strangelove, 32, 117, 117–18 Duck Soup, 114–15 Dylan, Bob, 74–82, 76 Eisenstadt, Alfred, 41 El General, 67 Eliot, T. S., 15 Ensor, James, 50–51 Erin Brockovich, 133 A Face in the Crowd, 100, 101, 103 Falk, Emily, 16 “Fight the Power,” 67 Ford, John, 105–8 Game of Thrones, 15 Gardner, Howard, 23 Gargantua, 58 Garibaldi, 1 Geertz, Clifford, 24 Geldof, Bob, 67 Glaucon, 66 The Godfather, Parts I and II, 111 Gone With the Wind, 129 The Great Dictator, 115–17, 116 Green Day, 67 Guernica, 53–54, 54 Guthrie, Woody, 73

Index

Haggard, Merle, 85 Haidt, Jonathan, 10 Handmaid’s Tale, 134 Haring, Keith, 62 Hartley, John, 24 Haskell, Molly, 133 Hecker, Frederich, 69 Hemingway, Ernest, 4 High Noon, 118–20 Hitler, Adolph, 17, 91 Holiday, Billie, 65, 82–83 Hopper, Edward, 60–61 Hunger Games, 133 ideology, 33 The Iliad, 13 An Inconvenient Truth, 148 Invasion of the Body Snatchers, 140–41 Iwo Jima, 41, 55 Jarrett, Keith, 84 Jefferson, Thomas (memorial), 1, 29 Kaplan, Robert D., 22 Kennedy, John F., 24–25, 56, 71 Kennedy, Robert, 71 Khrushchev, Nikita, 22–23 King, Martin Luther, Jr., 20, 29, 71 Lambert, Miranda, 86 Lange, Dorothea, 41 Lee, Spike, 131 Lehrer, Jonah, 19 Lennon, John, 71–72 Lerner, Max, 149 Lewis and Clark, 1 Lincoln, Abe, 29 Lorenzetti, Ambrogio, 47 Louis XIV, 48 MacDonald, Dwight, 95 MacDonald, Ian, 70 MAD Magazine, 27 Malcolm X, 131 The Manchurian Candidate, 13

Index

Mantle, Mickey, 1 The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, 105–7 Marley, Bob, 84–85 Mars, Bruno, 65 Massacre of the Innocents, 53 McCartney, Paul, 71 McLuhan, Marshall, 3, 92 Metropolis, 136, 137 Milk, 121–23 Moby Dick, 79 monuments, 29 Morrison, Toni, 13 Mozart, 68 Musgrave, Kacey, 86 Music Television (MTV), 86–87 “My Generation,” 65 myth, 24–25, 32 Nabucco, 65, 68, 70 Nast, Thomas, 58 Nelson, Willie, 85 Nietzsche, Frederik, 12, 58, 67 Nixon, Richard, 22 Norma Rae, 120–21 Norquist, Grover, 30 Obama, Barack, 15 The Odyssey, 13 Our Daily Bread, 99–100 Panetta, Leon, 21 Paths of Glory, 112 Patton, 113–14 Pearl Harbor, 22 Philips, Monica, 27 Picasso, Pablo, 53–54, 54 Pinker, Steven, 19 Plato, 65–66 Postman, Neil, 3, 32 Powermaker, Hortense, 149–50 Primary Colors, 102–3 The Prince, 48 Public Enemy, 67–68, 84 Pussy Riot, 68

Putnam, Robert, 60–61 “Q-Anon Shaman,” 44 Reagan, Ronald, 2, 15, 23, 30 reason, 19 Reggae, 84 “The Revolution Will Not be Televised,” 67 Riefenstahl, Leni, 17 Rivera, Diego, 58–59 Rockwell, Norman, 62 Rousseau, Jean Jacques, 67 Rubens, Peter Paul, 51, 53 Ruby, Jack, 41 Run the Jewels, 68 Sainte-Chapelle, 40 Sargent, John Singer, 54 Schjeldahl, Peter, 52, 61 Schlesinger, Arthur M. Jr., 149 Scott-Heron, Gil, 67 The Searchers, 105 Seeger, Pete, 74 The Siege, 142 September 11, 2001, 11, 57 Sex Pistols, 68 Shakespeare, William, 67 Shenkman, Rick, 16, 23, 25 Simmons, Annette, 18 Simone, Nina, 83, 83–84 Smith, Tommie, 41, 43 “Something Happening Here, or For What It’s Worth,” 67 Star Trek, 134 Star Wars, 94–95, 134 Steinbeck, John, 18 Sullivan’s Travels, 98–99 Superman, 1 theory, 32 Things to Come, 136, 138 Tiananmen Square, 42–44 Titian, 48, 49 Tocqueville, Alexi de, 97

167

168

Triumph of the Will, 5, 17, 91 Trump, Donald J., 7–10, 43, 85 Twain, Mark, 13 Understanding Media, 92 Underwood, Carrie, 86 Urban, Keith, 86 Ut, Nick, 41, 57 Verdi, 65, 68–70 Vietnam (War), 22, 41, 56–57, 94 visual age, 2–3 Wag the Dog, 30–31 war, 112–18

Index

Washington, George, 1, 25, 59, 67 Weber, Cynthia, 24, 31 “We Shall Overcome,” 31 West Wing, 128 The Who, 65 Wiene, Robert, 136 Winged Victory, 44 Young, Dennis, 27 Young, Neil, 75 “Z,” 125 Zanuck, Darryl, 92 Zero Dark Thirty, 133–34

About the Author

Michael A. Genovese holds the Loyola Chair of Leadership and serves as president of the Global Policy Institute at Loyola Marymount University. He has published over fifty books and, in 2016, received the Distinguished Teaching Award from the American Political Science Association.

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