[VIDEO] I wanted to take this time on the waning minutes of the 4th of July holiday to talk about The Purge: Election Year. I saw it on Sunday and had some thoughts. Mainly to express how glad that so far this nation hasn't turned to anyone similar to the "New Founding Fathers of America".
Somehow in this decade the NFFA is able to gain control of this nation and proposed an event known as the "purge" where it is legal to engage in criminal activities including murder for 12 hours. All emergenc services are suspended so basically whether you participate or not you're on your own.
In some of the synopsis of this film the NFFA and the "purge" is a result of the need to preserve economic prosperity. Essentially what was driven home in the last movie was how the purge is really used to eliminate those people who are dependent. In these movies there are racial overtones in this although I realize who could be targeted in that universe may not necessarily be of one race or ethnicity.
To be honest I never saw the first one but the gist of it is a family helps to protect a homeless man and are thus targeted by a group of purgers. BTW, I got a basic synopsis online so if you don't want to know what it's about especially if you haven't seen it please DO NOT click this link. Although I realize that this film was released in 2012.
The second one had a group of people hoping to survive the purge either being stranded in the wrong place during that period or finding themselves targets by the government. We find out more about this new regime who put this day in place and we find out that well not as many people are participating as they used to.
Then we go to the third one which is the most political of the series. The NFFA and an independent candidate are facing off over whether to keep the purge or abolish it. Of course this "political" movie also involves attempted assassinations and we nakedly see the ethnic and economic overtones of this event. We see more of these new founding fathers. They may not necessarily hold any public offices but obviously have enough influence to be the new regime of the United States.
BTW, worst part of this movie is a girl getting murdered after attempting to steal a candy bar from a store. In this world all you need is a messed up excuse to engage in this activity. I already knew the movie wouldn't end well for her and her crew. Also it's shown how this event can do nothing more than corrupt people.
With the NFFA comes an odd religion and then an odd prayer. The new founding fathers are blessed for letting American citizens to purge and "cleanse" their souls. America is referred to as a nation reborn - which becomes in my mind a very scary campaign slogan. In the third movie it seems the NFFA has their own religious arm which celebrates this purge.
All the same I could spend most of this post over-analyzing a fictional movie but I'm truly glad that in the real world we don't have such an event and never will. A character in "Election Year" said living in Mexico every night is a purge and it's already like this in some places here. We might find out the toll here in Chicago regarding how many people are killed or injury in violence throughout the city.
The new movie is fitting as it involves an election and we are in an election year now. The difference between that election which takes place at some point in the future vs now is that this election doesn't involve any idealistic candidate who seeks to do something major. The major party candidates are on opposite ends of the electorate ideologically and the nation generally isn't happy with them.
Either way, I'm glad that this isn't the nation we have now where there is such a legally sanctioned event.
