It's been about movies lately. There are two others to discuss a bit. Not new movies. In fact, one of them was from the eighties, another 'Dirty Harry' flick. This one was called "Sudden Impact". I hadn't seen all of it completely beginning to end. This time, I tried sitting through it all, but failed. However, not for too long. I went back and finished watching it all.
The movie might have laid it on too thick. Maybe that's why I turned it off, before going back to it. It actually turned out to have an interesting statement to make. That statement is the nature of justice, and what should be done about that. This is the point that is being made in all of the three Dirty Harry movies that I've seen. There are two more flicks in the series. It would seem that to go back and watch those would be overkill, so to speak.
The movie is categorized as "vigilante". That term is meant to disparage those who seek justice by any other means than the legal system. But what if the system fails to deliver justice? This is not a casual issue. There are those who want to keep it "by the book" all the way, all the time. But if that doesn't happen, then what? It is not a perfect world in which we live. What happens when the system fails? What happens when a grievance cannot be redressed by a government that only adds insult to injury?
The other movie also covers the same idea from another direction. Instead of law enforcement, it is about foreign policy. It was the Jason Bourne movies. In particular, this one was the last one, which was called "Ultimatum". The resolution seemed to be that when the system gets out of control, that others would step forward and make it right. The "bad guys" were arrested. The "good guys" prevail. Jason Bourne was vindicated. It seemed a satisfying ending, but was it really?
One thing about it was satisfying. If something goes wrong, the system shouldn't start killing people left and right. In the Ultimatum installment of the series, the system turned on itself. That is largely what the Jason Bourne series was about. It started as one agent seemingly going rogue ( Jason Bourne), and ended when the premise of the entire program was determined to be flawed. Or so it seemed. ( I tend to be quite skeptical of a moralizing media.)
There can always be disagreements about things. But there are times when it may well to question why the hell you are doing what you are doing. This is particularly important when the subject is government power. What happens when the government goes wrong? How do those grievances get redressed?
The way the system is supposed to work is to have a free and open discussion of what went wrong, and what can be done about it. A system that is really out of whack cannot be corrected in an atmosphere of secrecy and intrigue. It only compounds the problems. Just saying.
No comments:
Post a Comment