It's About the Screen!

When I watched a few YouTube clips from the 1958 film "The Big Country," I noticed how the camera would linger over the striking landscapes, which when reduced to the size of a netbook screen weren't so striking. This reminded me of the importance of properly viewing this kind of movie. This is certainly the case with "El Cid."

When you watch a big screen movie-- whose compositions and images and sound were designed for a large scale-- on a computer, you're getting maybe 1/100th of the real impact the artwork is supposed to have. When you see it on the largest home video screen possible, you're still getting maybe 1/4 to 1/2 the intended artistic experience.

Not all movies are like this. Some classic films well fit the intimacy of a small screen, and when blown up don't give all that much difference. I think of something like "All About Eve," black-and-white with small interior sets, and almost no shots taken outdoors. A big screen, in fact, sometimes reveals the staginess of these kind of films-- an example being the toy night club in "Citizen Kane."

To have people understand the impact and importance-- the sheer magnificent power-- of "El Cid" is why I'm pursuing the idea of the El Cid Project, showing the movie as it should be shown, at a time and place where its symbolism and power will be most strongly felt.

Stronger Magic

Apparently it was pointed out on TV's "Sixty Minutes" last night that there already is a mosque in Imam Rauf's Park 51 structure at Ground Zero. Commentators like Mike Gallagher sound pessimistic about moving it. The problem is using the wrong tactic against it. The direct head-on approach didn't work-- but there are other approaches.

The trick is to understand the mentality of Imam Rauf-- and confront his symbolic "magic" with stronger magic: namely, the great artwork and movie masterpiece known as "El Cid."

Another Movie

AT MY JOB the other day I was discussing western movies with a co-worker. We got around eventually to the 1958 classic, "The Big Country." Like "El Cid," it has unbelievably beautiful photography, dynamic characters played by the likes of Greg Peck, Jean Simmons, and Burl Ives, and a rousing musical score-- in this instance, by Jerome Moross. (Plus it has "El Cid"'s Charlton Heston in a supporting role, as well as one of my favorite all-time actresses, Carroll Baker, playing the spoiled daughter of a wealthy landowner.)

Afterward I looked up a few YouTube videos of the flick on the Internet. I haven't seen the film in years-- never on a movie screen. The opening credits and the trick riding sequence alone convey the movie's magic. It captures America in all its size, beauty, and sheer exuberance. The year 1958 stood at a peak of American confidence. There was no doubt THEN about ourselves and our culture. The great movie westerns like "The Big Country" were a celebration of American culture, history, and spirit. A wonderful spirit which no one should apologize for. Didn't American culture, freedom, and energy capture the imagination of the world?

What's my point? My point is that America needs to renew itself by remembering why it was founded, by reconnecting with its authentic culture and its cultural and historical roots. America is a unique place. "American" is a distinct identity. My forebears didn't come here to be watered-down facsimiles of the world they left. They came to become American-- and they became American, melding themselves into America; earning that through their belief in American ideals and by their hard work. America isn't some multicultural imitation of Europe, Asia, Africa, Mexico, or Arabia. It's a unique place and thing unto itself. The minute we throw away that identity-- the minute we become afraid to embrace and defend it and this land, this place-- then we become no longer visionary and great.

The Real Battle

The real battle in America and other Western cultures is over what kind of societies they're going to be, what their cultures will look like. It's over whether they will remain unapologetically Western with all that entails, all the magnificent principles, thought, spirit, and art-- or whether they will instead become amorphous meaningless blobs where there are no distinctions-- and no distinction-- where everything is assumed to be, indeed mandated to be, of equal value; a characterless uncourageous blob beyond good and evil, ultimately beyond intelligence, a limp flag symbolizing a once-great memory flapping in the breeze.

Understanding Rauf

The elite media in this country are incapable of understanding Imam Rauf. They see in him what they choose to see-- a reflection of themselves. They confuse the average Muslim American, who no doubt just wants to be a good citizen, and the Islamic intelligentsia, who are required by their positions to be ideologues; who are obligated by the dictates of their religion to "plant the flag" of Islam wherever they can. This is what the Ground Zero controversy is about.

The idea of the El Cid Project is to oppose symbolism with symbolism.

The Hero

The very idea of the hero has become an archaic concept in today’s cultural climate. Presented instead as models are endlessly self-involved moral jellyfish incapable of grasping the notion of a cause or meaning greater than themselves. When you wipe out the ability to distinguish differences between societies, civilizations, people, and actions, you not only elevate the concept of the world as meaningless mush, you’re not seeing or understanding reality at all. Are there things in life and the world worth fighting for? Yes there are!

Who You Are

Thanks to America's disastrous education system, there's been created a group of people in this country who are afraid to identify themselves as Americans-- much less as Americans of Christian (or, if you will, Judeo-Christian) heritage. For them there's an embarrassment at anything associated with the very idea, and so they collapse in the face of those who do know who they are, and who strongly present a belief system alternative such as Islam. There's nothing wrong with Islam if it can demonstrate it's compatible with Western civilization, isn't trying to conquer or alter it, and is willing to repel jihadist extremists from its ranks. Islam needs to adapt to America. America won't adapt to it. The jury is still out regarding this.

The movie "El Cid" should be seen as an acceptable, liberal model for what I'm talking about.