politics

THE NEUTRAL GROUND: the supremacist legacy of old statues

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Photo caption: C.J. Hunt in NEUTRAL GROUND. Photo courtesy of PBS POV.

In the pointed documentary The Neutral Ground, C.J. Hunt explores the continuing legacy of Confederate monuments in America. Finding the backlash against removing New Orleans’ Confederate monuments so absurd, Hunt, a producer for The Daily Show, started out to make a snarky YouTube video. But he found himself drawn more deeply into the history of Confederate monuments, so intentionally braided with white supremacy.

In my view (and C.J. Hunt’s), it’s a no-brainer to remove monuments that should never have been erected in the first place. After all, these monuments celebrate men who led a traitorous insurrection against their own country, who sought to keep other human beings enslaved and who lost a disastrous war. Traitors. Slavers. Losers.

But Hunt is fascinated by the chorus of White Southerners advocating for the preservation of Confederate monuments to maintain pride in (White) Southern heritage. All of them claim that the Civil War was not about slavery. And none of them would say that they are White supremacists or that slavery was acceptable. Hunt notes a disconnect with historical fact:

“The founding documents of the Confederacy talk so obsessively about slavery, the real mystery is how so many people came to believe that Confederate symbols have nothing to do with it.”

I am a student of American history, and this is one of my pet peeves. If you’re interested, you can read more thoughts about THE NEUTRAL GROUND and the Lost Cause lie.

Now back to the movie, The Neutral Ground.

Hunt is very funny. To a woman who wants to keep all the statues in their prominent places with plaques for context, he suggests this wording: “Hi, I’m Robert E. Lee. A long time ago, I turned on my country and led over 200,000 Southern sons to their graves, so we could keep our basic right to own human beings as property. #SorryI’mNotSorry“.

After meeting a round of genteel “as long as you stay in your place” racists, Hunt is unnerved by encounters with the “I want to kill you” variety of racists.

For me, the highlights of The Neutral Ground were Hunt’s sparring with his own African-American father. His dad, moving about his kitchen in an Aunt Jemima apron, critically recounts the evolution of C.J.’s own racial awareness and imparts his own unblinking view of institutional racism in America. This repartee sets the stage for The Neutral Ground to become even more personally-focused for C.J. Hunt.

I watched The Neutral Ground on PBS’ POV; it’s now streaming on PBS.

MY NAME IS BULGER: two brothers, two paths to power

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William Bulger in MY NAME IS BULGER. Photo courtesy of discovery+.

The documentary My Name Is Bulger traces the life of one fascinating man – made even more compelling by the life of a second man. Bill Bulger, one of nine kids raised in the projects, was a political wunderkind. First elected at age 26, his 35-year career in the Massachusetts State Legislature was topped by 18 years as President of the State Senate. No less than the squeaky clean former Governor Michael Dukakis credits Bill Bulger for cleaning up the previously corrupt institution.

Now, here’s the kicker – while Bill Bulger was dominating Massachusetts politics, his brother James “Whitey” Bulger was the state’s most fearsome crime lord.

Politics is public, and crime is private. Politics requires self-promotion, and crime requires secrecy. The brothers Bulger are parallel studies in power.

For decades, my day job has been in politics. It’s not unusual for politicians to deal with embarrassing, and even unsavory, relatives, but what do you do if your vocation is politics and your older sibling is a notorious criminal?

Very bright and armed with wit and charm, Bill Bulger was able to artfully, even miraculously, keep his career separate from Whitey’s. As Whitey became more infamous, Bill was able to delay being hurt by the association. It was widely known that Whitey had been in Alcatraz as early as 1959.

We meet Bill Bulger himself, now 85, and several of his adult children (who also remember their “Uncle Jim”). Dukakis appears, along with another former governor, William Weld. There’s also a former crime partner of Whitey’s. And we hear from the recently released Catherine Greig, Whitey’s longtime girlfriend and fellow fugitive, captured with Whitey in Santa Monica.

As sympathetic to Bill Bulger as is My Name Is Bulger, it doesn’t hide his opposition to busing in the 1970s, a political necessity that put him on the same side as South Boston’s ugliest racists. Nor does it shy away from the moment Whitey became a high-profile fugitive and Bill was cornered into taking the Fifth.

William Bulger in MY NAME IS BULGER. Photo courtesy of discovery+.

My Name Is Bulger is told from the point of view of Bill Bulger’s family. The Bulgers are understandably resentful of Bill’s political enemies in the press (and former Governor Mitt Romney). It’s more difficult to appreciate the family grudge against the government for harshness to Whitey, who, after all, was convicted of 19 murders.

For the story of how Whitey was able to use the FBI to eliminate his competition in the local Italian Mafia and the Irish mob, I also recommend another recent doc, Whitey: The United States vs. James J. Bulger.

My Name Is Bulger will stream on discovery+ beginning June 17.

VICE: like Macbeth, only funny

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Christian Bale in VICE

Vice is the comic biopic of Dick Cheney by writer-director Adam McKay (The Big Short).  Cheney is played by a physically transformed and unrecognizable Christian Bale.

McKay’s take is that Cheney’s driving motivation and genius is the accumulation and exercise of power – to whatever end and by whatever means.  McKay also sees Cheney as a mediocre slacker molded and fueled by Lynne Cheney (Amy Adams), whose own ambitions were limited in the 1960s by her gender.  So, this is a tale of ruthless grasping along the lines of Macbeth or House of Cards, only mostly non-fiction.

McKay drops in the horrifying real impacts of Cheney’s exercise of power, but this is mostly a very funny movie.  Donald Rumsfeld, Cheney’s mentor in power-grabbing, and George W. Bush, Cheney’s stooge, are played for laughs in very broad performances by Steve Carell and Sam Rockwell.  McKay also tosses in a funny faux ending and has Dick and Lynne, in bed for the night, erupt in Shakespearean dialogue.  Jesse Plemons plays a fictional Everyman narrator.

Bale’s performance is extraordinary, and goes well beyond the impeccable impersonation, down to every Cheney mannerism – stoneface, sneer and grunt.  Adams is excellent as his Lady Macbeth.  So is the rest of the fine cast, especially Alsion Pil as lesbian daughter Mary, Tyler Perry as Colin Powell and Shea Whigham as Lynne Cheney’s probably murderous father.

Vice is pretty good history, biography from a sharp point of view and a damn entertaining movie.