Worrying world of war films

Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg have remade the classic sci-fi film War of the Worlds, and the rave reviews are already in. I’m quite eager to see it, having been a life long fan of the book-come-radio play-come-(now three) films. The 1960s film production was my favourite childhood sci-fi movie, perhaps only eclipsed by yet another alien invasion movie with an unimaginative title.

Despite that, is it just me or is there something grotesquely ironic in all this? We are, after all, talking about a film chronicling the destruction of an entire society by technologically advanced outsiders rapaciously seeking dominion over the weaker party. Call me a kill joy, but you don’t need to invoke science fiction to create such a story. There’s plenty of real world inspiration out there. Tom Cruise and his fellow (mostly white, American) earthlings could easily be substituted for Iraqis, the aliens for American soldiers and the Bush Administration. Donald Rumsfeld wouldn’t require any makeup whatsoever.

War of the Worlds is self-evidently a propaganda film, akin to many other invasion-themed sci-fi movies from the Cold-War era. That the movie will no doubt be a blockbuster reveals a great deal about the novelty of invasion, war and destruction to people who have never experienced it first hand. People like you and I. Yes, Americans have had an experience of invasion of sorts on September 11, and apparently the film echoes that day in a scene where Cruise is covered in New York debris like ash. Australians too may invoke the Bali bombings. But those experiences are, terrible as it is to consider, most notable as exceptions to the general global trend. We simply cannot comprehend what it is like to see our society engulfed in violence and dysfunction, not to mention the emotional effects. Almost as if to confirm this, the War Memorial in Australia’s capital recently refused to include any reference to the clashes between the early European colonists and the Aboriginal population.

Films like War of the Worlds represent another strange contradiction. They are evidence of our never ending capacity to recapitulate collective (and individual) experiences into narratives quite independent of the original inspiration. Hence the litany of war movies in which the aggressor is painted as a noble warrior trying to escape death in a savage, alien land. For example, movies like Black Hawke Down and Zulu, which are both absorbing, brilliantly produced action flicks that happen to be total propaganda, not to mention completely factually inaccurate. With that in mind, repeat the following verses…

There’s only so much you can do
The world's an imperfect place

Worst placed am I to comment
I’m a product of my space
(And time in history!)

PS: I’ve been nominated for an award for the most hyphens in a single blog entry. Wish me luck!