'The Patriot' Is Not A Good Movie
The Mel Gibson vehicle offers a very cringe message
Independence Day is upon us, which inevitably leads to folks sharing memes from The Patriot. The 2000 film remains popular 24 years after its release, particularly among conservatives. It stars Mel Gibson, and right-wingers can’t get enough of his films. It claims to be a patriotic film that celebrates the heroism of the American revolutionaries. It’s also one of the few films about the American Revolution, which, despite liberal efforts, is an inherently right-coded theme. The main character also takes up arms to defend his family and property, a feature liberals squirmed over. It’s not hard to see why conservatives love the film. The perception that it’s Braveheart set in the Revolutionary War.
But that perception is wrong. The film is not good for two reasons. One, it’s a schlocky film that oozes cheese and kitsch. It has more in common with ‘90s disaster movies than it does with the classic Braveheart. The other problem is more important. While quality is in the eye of the beholder, the message of The Patriot cannot be disputed. The film presents America as being founded on the principles of multicultural liberalism. It’s an insidious message for a pro-America movie aimed at the masses–and it’s why you shouldn’t like it.
Some people think The Patriot, like Braveheart, is directed by Mel Gibson. If that were true, it would be a much better film. Instead, Gibson merely stars in it. Instead, the film is directed by Roland Emmerich, the gay German master of disaster flicks. He’s most known for making Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow, and 2012. Emmerich can make an entertaining blockbuster. Independence Day is a classic. Midway, which is a film entirely about planes sinking ships, is also worth-watching.
However, when Emmerich is taken to colonial America, he’s woefully out of his element. He tries his best to dress in standard schlock as Revolutionary War reenactment. While the battle scenes are cool, the characters are caricatures, the human interactions are cringe, the light-hearted humor ruins the vibe, and everything is just a mess. This scene where the protagonist’s youngest daughter finally speaks illustrates many of the film’s problems. Emmerich cannot resist the stupidly saccharine.
There are decent elements in the movie. Gibson gives a good performance, the action scenes are decent, and there are a few great lines. But The Patriot ultimately falls flat.
But worse than its cringe-inducing scenes is the film’s message. It imagines that our Founding was won by a diverse array of characters with the attitudes and assumptions of modern liberals. Gibson’s character Benjamin Martin doesn’t own slaves; instead, he has free blacks working for fair wages! Even as a kid, I knew this was ridiculous. Martin is primarily based on the legendary “Swamp Fox,” Francis Marion. Marion was an effective guerrilla leader who harried the redcoats in South Carolina. He was a slaveowner, as were the other southern patriots that Benjamin Martin’s character was modeled after. Rather than fighting with freedmen, Marion fought against former slaves fighting for the British. He was also a dedicated Indian fighter. Needless to say, he and his fellow Southerners were not racial egalitarians.
The film imagines that the Patriots were fighting for racial equality. One scene shows a bigoted soldier reading in disgust of how George Washington promises emancipation to any black man who volunteers. Such a notice posted in the South would have driven the locals to favor the British. Patriot propaganda asserted that the British were trying to stir up slave insurrections against whites and used black soldiers in the field. While a few blacks did serve as combat soldiers in the Continental Army in the North, they were given no such role in the South.
The presence of the black soldier in Martin’s unit is to convey the impression that we were fighting against the racism of the Old World. As argued by Benjamin Martin’s son, Gabriel: “They call this the New World. It's not. It's the same as the old. But we have the chance to build a new world. A world where all men are created equal under God.” He tells that to the black soldier, who happily agrees with the opinion. The ending of the film concludes with the black soldier helping to build this more equal New World. That soldier even convinces the bigot who couldn’t believe Washington would free the slaves to see blacks as fellow citizens.
The Patriot has further digressions into multiculti fantasy. Martin’s family finds refuge within a runaway slave community. His unit also finds shelter there as well. It’s implied blacks are fleeing from the racist British. In reality, the Patriots would’ve been coming down hard on such communities while the British would’ve recruited from them.
The British are caricatured to play to modern American prejudices. They are elitist white men who despise democracy, blacks, and the common man. They even commit horrific atrocities that are beyond human comprehension. British reviewers hated how their countrymen were depicted in the film, but being made too villainous isn’t the problem. There’s nothing wrong with making villains fit the role in a big-budget film. No American wants the redcoats to be the good guys in a Revolutionary epic. However, the nature of the Brits serves as a stark contrast to the colonials’ egalitarianism and multiculturalism. The dead white men are those we defeated, not the Americans themselves.
It’s unlikely 2000 audiences would’ve cheered on the Patriots’ actual views on race. It’s understandable why Hollywood would insert a token black character and emphasize a protagonist did not own slaves. But the end result comes out as inane. The Patriot can serve as an advertisement for the modern Democratic Party. “Our nation was built on diversity. We fought a war against elitist white men to free the slaves. Our revolution permanently separated America from European civilization.”
A lot of liberals and some conservatives clap like seals at such pablum. We don’t need to.
The required politically correct features of The Patriot would’ve been better handled by Gibson as a director. The film itself would’ve been a more serious work that could have explored the brutal realities of the backcountry war. The conflict usually pitted American against American in unrelenting partisan warfare. Both sides committed atrocities. Gibson’s other work proves he can handle such a story.
Emmerich’s other work proves he can’t. The German director piles on the schmaltz, which makes The Patriot’s PC message more unbearable. The combination ultimately makes it a bad film.
One can still enjoy the memes and gifs from The Patriot without pretending it’s a great film. If you want to watch an entertaining blockbuster for July 4th, Independence Day is a much better choice.
You'll find most history pieces that deal with slavery have a main character who hates slavery and racism.
I'm still amazed how some somewhat racially conscious whites still view the late 90's and early 2000's as the golden age of cinema partly because of the relative absence of anti-whiteness. Indeed the movies were generally much better than anything produced these days but movies still contained the stock multicult themes and there was anti-whiteness in some movies but it was more subtle than what we see today.
In "the Patriot" you had the thoughtful and soft spoken negro who finally wins over the white bigot by saving his life in battle. And in "Independence Day" I recall that most of the heroes and good folk were black, Hispanic, Asian and Jewish. Other movies of the era cast blond haired white people, usually males, as arch villains.