The Patriot
Columbia Pictures
165 minutes
Starring Mel Gibson
2000

The imperialists have produced a politically 
correct movie about the Revolution of 1776. Mel 
Gibson plays a war hero who committed atrocities 
against French and indigenous peoples to settle 
the united $tates. This same war hero then ends up 
fighting in the Revolution of 1776 despite trying 
to avoid it.

The British have a problem: They want to "conduct 
business" with the Americans after they 
succcessfully crush the Revolution. There seems to 
be some modern pre-occupation with humyn-rights by 
General Cornwallis, who says at first that he does 
not want to brutalize the Americans into 
opposition. In the end, our hero Mel Gibson 
playing Benajamin Martin ends up giving 
Cornwallis's brutal lackey what he deserves but 
only after losing two sons to the same man.

Throughout the film, the tension is between duty 
to one's country and duty to one's family. 
"Patriot" resolves this tension by having Benjamin 
Martin come to believe he lost a son because he 
had not hastened the Revolution sooner. In one 
atrocity in the war, the British round up all the 
non-fighting villagers, lock them in a church and 
burn them to death. Thus the revolutionary, anti-
colonial fighters lost their family members.

Throughout the film, the slaves get it the worst. 
While white activists often escape the repression, 
the British execute the slaves of the rebels. 
Shown contempt throughout the film by the southern 
whites fighting alongside him against the English, 
the main Black soldier character finally gains 
respect as he faces the British army head-on, 
after officially gaining his freedom. As a 
metaphor, this is indeed what has happened in most 
countries including for most ethnicities in the 
united $tates--respectability through war for an 
integrated country. In history, the situation of 
Blacks did not end up as well as portrayed in the 
film.

"Patriot" leaves a very ambiguous legacy. In the 
United $tates today, every last word and act of 
every last Confederate of the U.S. Civil War 
receives doting attention by neo-Confederate 
museum buffs and other disgruntled whites. 
On weekends, they re-enact their favorite
scenes of the Civil War, over and over again. Meanwhile,
the anti-colonial revolution and the principled
Liberal beliefs of many of the revolutionaries
receive less prominence.

Today it is the united $tates napalming villages,
bombing weddings and burning down churches with people
inside. That is why the American Revolution does not
actually play much role in Amerikkkan nationalism.
Even politically mediocre films like "Patriot" help
to even the balance a little bit.