Making America Gory Again: How Trumpism Purge Movies Trumpism | Movie

T The movie The Purge: Anarchy, the second of a growing franchise, ends with images of loaded pistols, young children shooting at ranges and scenes of gun violence , juxtaposed with images of American pastoral, Mount Rushmore, dollar bills and the American flag, his red bands replaced by guns and knives. The movie The Purge, released the previous year, was a horror movie with low budget and large scale, but since then, with a fourth movie today and a television series en route. the franchise has become more and more political and provocative, with growing box office revenue. What began as a gender exercise turned into a war cry, with metaphors giving way to primal cries.

The underlying vanity is solid: for a period of 12 hours, one day a year, the US government sanctions all crimes, up to and including murder. Emergency services are not available for the duration of the "purge", while those who wish can take personal grudges to macabre conclusions without criminal consequences. As a result, crime as a whole is at its lowest level, fewer people live below the poverty line and the unemployment rate is 1%. But as the series has developed, the emerging theme has been that those behind the purge are doing so to improve their financial situation: killing the poor, thereby reducing the need for well-being, health care and housing.

Ethan Hawke's character in the first film was the face of American apathy, an owner who sells security systems to the rich while those who can not afford such protection are slaughtered . The movie was a commentary on the clbad, but still great for thrills and spills. The subsequent releases were also, but as the films explored different American demographics, the critical views of the filmmakers – author-director James DeMonaco and producer Jason Blum – became more important.

The first three films were all made Barack Obama, but from the beginning were a reaction to the culture of guns, and to those who allow it. "The movies talk about the crazy relationship we have in the country with guns, and the fact that there are more weapons than in the US," says Blum, who also Get Out and BlackkKlansman by Spike Lee. "Congress has blocked the arms control that Obama has put in place, James DeMonaco and I are fairly outspoken in our political opinions, and these opinions are very much in the movies, they relate to the power of the NRA and the Absurdity of our firearms laws here.It is an edifying account of how these laws are dangerous and absurd. "

The ultra-religious and democratically elected government party that introduced the Purge calls the New Founding Fathers of America (NFFA), and every episode of the franchise focuses more emphatically on the opposing voices.There have been many attempts to give a voice to both parties, and not always hysterically.The second film featured a conversation in a middle-clbad dining room, during which family members bickered in a slightly veiled version of the arms control debate. he proudly calls it "anti-purge household"; his middle-aged daughter is not in agreement. "Do not make me shit, bitch," she says when she's questioned, and personal quarrels are quickly resolved in the rain of bullets. It's not a good idea to settle disputes with rifles

The third film, Election Year, was conceived in 2014, and far right Minister Edwidge Owens was inspired, said DeMonaco, by Ted Cruz, who was preparing to run for the post on more important at the time. . The rewrites preceding the release of the film in 2016, however, doubled the NFFA's white supremacy, while equivalent voices in the real world became more confident and brazenly public. DeMonaco has made the attitude of the NFFA, he said, more "Trump-like". By this film, the metaphor almost disappears, with Hillary Clinton's inspired presidential candidate, Senator Roan, who does not identify the NFFA but his inspiration in the real world: "The money generated by purging pockets of the NRA and insurance, "she says.

Art and life merge into one here. Election Year was shot in September 2015, before the Trump-Clinton campaign became ugly, and seemed strangely prescient when it was released in July 2016. Meanwhile, the film's slogan, "Keep America Great," was been announced by Trump. this year, as its slogan for the 2020 campaign. It's unlikely to be a tribute.

"As the franchise grew, it becomes less parable and more political, but that's because the situation has become more dramatic." Says Blum. Wearing his mask He has, in fact, swapped for an iconic headgear: the new prequel poster The First Purge, the first of the franchise to be written and filmed under Trump, has simply introduced the red cap Make President's America Great Again, with the slogan Exchanged for the title of the film

In the past, Blum, who gives his point of view on Twitter, said that politics in his films should be secondary to entertainment, but that has clearly changed. "As an American, I feel completely trapped," he says. "The same goes for more than 50% of the country. And one of the ways out of this trap is to make movies about it. So, certainly, the messages came to the surface. Whenever there is a shootout in the United States, there is a loud voice that says that the way to avoid a shootout is to stack more weapons in the world. The president thinks that teachers should carry guns in schools, which is simply absurd. The concept of The Purge, when we started, was this fantastic idea. But because we have a wacko for a president, it seems a lot less far-fetched today. "

It is undeniable that, for all politics, the primary purpose of Purge's films is to entertain and appeal to the public's fantasies, as misplaced as they may be. , the thirst for blood at stake. While the movies claim to show us just how horrific the carnage is, they also end up with cathartic badaults against the evildoers – we're meant to encourage the bloodshed – even DeMonaco , author-director of the first three films and author of the last, said he feared that the films could not switch to exploitation, and he wants to remain involved in the franchise to protect them.He already had to cut scenes that went wrong, including a mbad rape montage that his wife and the film's distributor, Universal, opposed

The anti-arms, the movies wallow despite the violence of the weapons. to be that it's not s I think that the often quoted solution to the problem of firearms is more false. But the violence of the films is satisfactory, the message is lost, momentarily at least, in the mix. Blum says he's troubled by "a small percentage of the audience" in the US who seem to think that purging is a good idea, judging by the reactions he's badessed during projections.

"I think about it all the time, you say," says Blum. "But I'm behind the movies, I'm proud of them and I'm doing more.I have come to the place, in the end, that good outweighs the I do not think the movies are perfect, but you can not make a movie about gun and gun control, and badault weapons in particular, in the United States, and that it's all about birds. "

This is a delicate dance. "We love guns, we love violence, and we hate when that happens," said Ethan Hawke, promoting the first film. "We have a strange, violent dance, as a country, and I think the film puts its finger on it." Which is a fair badessment: these films speak of legitimate fears, both macro and micro, all giving us the opportunity to take advantage of the violence.

Hawke's "as a country" addendum is also relevant. From the beginning, the series is announced as a response to a specifically American syndrome. The purge is an outlet, we are told in the first installment, for "American rage". These films are presented as an edifying tale for other countries, and in France the franchise is called American Nightmare.

And with profits increasing each time, the message becomes stronger. It is a big film franchise that takes shots at the government, and that does not shoot any fist while it claims its case. It can be frank, but it's still a weapon.

• The First Purge is published on July 4th.