To start, I think a full disclosure is in order. I went into this movie with serious issues regarding the concept and its follow-through from my first viewing of the trailer alone. I went to see The Purge at the AMC Theatre in Metairie, LA on June 10th, 2013 at 3:45 PM.
There were about thirty people in the audience including myself, my friend Sierra, about twenty odd people in the back and two obnoxious people directly behind us who were occasionally more interesting than the movie itself. I am still unsure if the two people were seated behind us were a couple or an elderly woman and her son; she was in her sixties it seemed and he was an older looking 40 something, but I felt I was sitting in front of Ignatius J. Riley and his mom, Irene (which seems apt since they both talked throughout the movie).
Ignatius: Sit down!
Irene: I cain't git comf'table!
Sierra, who was mortified that I had stopped procrastinating and picked a time to watch this movie, was certain it would be the single worst film of all time. I was more positive, but then the movie trailers began erode my optimism (two paranormal horror trailers with similar plots; both starring Patrick Wilson of Watchmen fame, the sequels; Kick-Ass 2 and Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters). Not a single trailer for a foreign made film. No documentaries. Nothing with Philip Seymour Hoffman whatsoever! I was in over my head.
Ignatius: Hrumphf!
Irene: When's deh moveh staught?
The movie starts; that's when the trouble begins. Set in 2022 (not 2026 as was reported by at least one reviewer who may not have watched the movie) the night the movie takes place marks the eleventh annual purge; which means the first one would have taken place in 2012 (maybe they can fix that when it goes to DVD). The movie's radio announcer intro and video footage montage give a quick overview of what is happening throughout the country during the Purge along with a dose of the deliberately contrived and anything-but-subtle social commentary which occurs repeatedly throughout the movie. It was as if it were written so preschool age children would understand that the Purge was 'bad' for people, but that people like James Sandin (Ethan Hawke) 'couldn't see it at the time'. Sandin is a proud supporter of the annual Purge but is having trouble convincing his children of the importance of this 'necessary evil'. Enough about James, because if he is supposed to be the protagonist he is one of the most tepid in film history.
Somehow, James and his family almost lose track of time having a sensible no-carb dinner: the 'calm before the storm' plot device awkwardly wedged in between moments of domestic tension and ... moments of domestic tension.
THE PURGE BEGINS!!!!
...well, it seemed more like a flash flood warning.
Irene: Dey watch it on da tee-vee?
No, they all pretend it isn't happening. All the drama, all the violence and we are watching a rich family do the same boring shit they probably did every other day of the year. Except...
A nameless bloody stranger (and that's how he's credited too; played by Edwin Hodge) walks into the neighborhood, pleading for aid. James' young son, Charlie (Max Burkholder) heeds the call for some reason (because he really didn't seem to care too much beforehand) and suddenly the plot races into high gear!!!
Not really.
Suddenly, a group of masked, upper-middle class caucasians (but, hey, that's just casting) descend on the Sandins like a bored swarm of overgrown trick-or-treaters. They are so unassuming that James looks out of a security window and barely seems to care (hmm, The Hellfire Club paying me a visit, ho hum). The leader of the Manson-family-esque group shows up masked. He then removes his mask to reveal the same damned face that was the damned mask!
Was I not supposed to laugh?
Irene: Why's he laughin'?
Ignatius: The nerve!
So, this guy just wants to kill a homeless guy. No big deal. He came to pick up his homeless guy, which he knows is in the house (thankfully, or else this movie would have been very different ...somehow). He wants this 'homeless swine' (he said that about five times) and he wants him alive so he can kill him outside along with his friends or else his friends will come inside and kill everyone inside.
Irene: Awe, he's homeless.
To a guy like James Sandin, with no character and no moral compass and no personality except a love for his family and a love for his own self-preservation, this should be a no brainer. He goes to work trying to find the bloody, apparently homeless, stranger (who, just because I was told not to mention race, I will point out is the only black male character) who is somewhere in his house. He finds his homeless, bloody African-American quarry...
Irene: Is dem dawgtags he's got?
...his homeless, bloodied, war veteran quarry 'who just happens to be African-American' holding a gun to his daughter's head. Somehow, James is able to capture his ever increasing adjectival prey and binds him for export out of the house to the patiently awaiting horde (led by a guy who vaguely resembles Matt Smith but lacks the British accent and has a crome shotgun instead of a sonic screwdriver).
Ignatius: Preposterous!
And he gives the homeless dude to the bad guys, the end.
JK
LMAO
James, facing the scorn and hatred of his entire family, decides to fight.
James decides to fight back because he realizes that he was helping to perpetuate a malignant social system.
James makes the bold decision to protect a total stranger and put his family and himself in danger because he has an epiphanal moment of clarity in which he knows it better to fight for the rights of the few than to coalesce to the will of the many, if the many be of ill will!
The truth is, no one will ever know why exactly James decides to fight back, probably just that the movie was only half over and hardly anybody had been killed.
Whatever the reason, James decides to reject everything he stands for and protect a stranger at the risk of his and his family's wellbeing. The result, a bloody onslaught at the hands of the band of heavily armed masked rich kids (the leader is wearing a blazer with what looks to be a boarding school crest on the breast).
For once, the loudest people weren't Ignatius and his momma, but the crowd in the back; clapping and cheering as a wave of violence washed over the rest of the movie. I was reminded, at the cheers and laughter, that not everyone considered this a horror movie in the strictest sense and that some viewers may have simply wished to see violence; a violent release, much like what The Purge was meant to be for the future America being portrayed onscreen (at least in one neighborhood).
I went into the theatre with several preconceived notions about The Purge. I anticipated that the movie would be an awkward horror/torture film which tries to artificially imbue it with a socially conscious message. I anticipated that there would be an awkward racial element. I anticipated laughing quite a lot during the movie. I was mostly right.
I do have to admit. I did not anticipate the use of 'Patriotism as a motivation/justification for violence' motif which seemed to be overlook in many of the very scathing reviews I read of others online. The attempts to show the media as protector of the status quo while it poses as honest journalism. Little things like that were nice but still did not fix a clunky script, not for me at least.
There is one major plot element I left for the very end, one that seems to be the most real when looked at outside of the context of this movie, the notion that humans are essentially violent and hateful beasts in need of regular acts of malice. If one were to ask around their friends and acquaintanceship, one might find a number of people who believe this to be true. The idea that humans are inherently violent is engrained American foreign policy and is the cornerstone of the common popular misunderstanding of Darwinism which does not actually claim 'survival of the fittest' but rather simply purports adaptation as the reason for change over time. This concept, however well accepted as fact, is really a construct and a self-fulfilling one at that. This belief that humans are naturally violent leads to murder and execution, to war and genocide. It's either US or THEM! This is the concept that The Purge takes on head first. The movie puts forth the statement that, even in situations of extreme danger and impending death, people can choose non-violence. No matter how clunky this movie may be, it does have that whole thing going for it.
Irene: Ignatius, what town dat movie set in?
Ignatius: No doubt some vile den of iniquity like New York or Los Angeles.
Irene: I bet if dey did dat puh-idge down here, it look mitey diff'rent. People always be livin' like dat down here.
Ignatius: It was an abysmal display! A rancorous of a film if you can call them films at all! I will not speak of it again, Mother!
Irene: Oh, dat Eatin' Hawke, doh! He is something else!
Ignatius: Mother! Please!
Great post!
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