Land of the Blind

I know I said that my next blog would be the other half of my paper, but I had more pressing thoughts. It'll come, whether or not anyone reads it has yet to be determined.

I just finished watching Land of the Blind with my wife. It's probably the sixth time I've seen it, and I did my textual analysis on it for Media & Society, so I more or less know it inside out (except the damn elephants! What are the elephants?).

However, something jumped out at me this time, two seemingly unconnected dots on opposite sides of the movie.

The first of the two dots occur early in the film, when Thorn is still incarcerated, and has just met Joe, the then prison guard. Thorn relates the story of Rudolph Hess - his imprisonment following the fall of the Nazi's, and incarceration in Spandau, and finally the tearing down of Spandau, following his death. Thorn references Hess regarding the pall of a single man's spectre, and the need to hide and erase all traces of his existence.

Late in the movie, after Thorn's assassination, Joe is informed that he will be staying in prison due to his role in the president's assassination. There is then a series of shots of Joe in prison, doing various things, but it is clear that the prison is in disrepair, and no one else is around. Joe is the last man in prison - the reincarnation of Hess.

As far as literary devices go, I understand that it's some simple foreshadowing. As far as the story goes, it's a neat coincidence in the plot. The subtext, however is decidedly more complicated that all this. From what we see of Joe's life and service, he's an individual of integrity, honestly, and honour. He makes careful, reasoned decisions, and ends up on the losing side of every conflict. He becomes the greatest liability to both the Citizens for Justice and Democracy - he was an elite commando for the Bonaventure Emperor, he knew Thorn before his cult of personality, and was dedicated to his nation, not the revolution; for the Bonaventures he was equally untrustworthy - he betrayed Maximillian II, aided and abetted the CJD, and following Thorn's death, could have been a credible rallying point for the majority who despised both regimes, as not being tainted by either.

So, it would appear that the well intentioned Joe is a casualty of history - and maybe that is why the writer brought up Hess. How many people have been carried along into movements, but have been tainted by those movements, and what we associate with them. It's unreasonable to believe that every German, or even every Nazi was as ravening an anti-Semite as Hitler. It's not politically correct to say so, but some people are simply good people on the wrong side.

On this basis, why don't we step back from the common practice of using broad strokes when dealing with Nazis, Soviets, and a score of other twentieth century tragedies. There is plenty of evidence of what went wrong in those times and places. Let's find a few things that went right.

To start with, I recommend something along the lines of Twenty Letters to a Friend, by Svetlana Alliluyeva. Writings like this bring some much needed humanity into our perceptions of what are widely accepted to be 'evil' men. With a more balanced understanding, we can begin to realize that they were perhaps ordinary men, who became carried away in extraordinary circumstances, and made the mistakes which they are remembered for. As human as I am, or as much as you are. No more, no less.