“One Battle After Another” wants a revolution.
What’s more, the movie wants you to want one, too.
The film opens with scenes of an immigrant detention center near the U.S.-Mexico border. The film’s protagonists, however, aren’t there. Not yet. The characters the film follows (and hopes we pull for) are members of a far-left revolutionary group called “The French 75.” They’re planning – as you might guess – to raid the center and free the immigrants there.
The film’s leading man, Bob Ferguson, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, is all in. Called “Rocketman” by the radicals, Ferguson supplies the flashy stuff – the distracting pyrotechnics that give the rest of the group the opportunity to strike.
And strike they do. At the migration center, first, but then at banks, government offices, and wherever else the group sees fit. They bomb buildings after hours, steal at gunpoint, and vandalize. While they generally try to keep people from being hurt, the occasional human casualty doesn’t stop the group from their campaign of terror.
Their goal? Perfidia Beverly Hills, one of the group’s leaders and Ferguson’s love-interest, leaves no question. As she puts a federal agent at gunpoint she declares, “Free borders, free bodies, free choices, and free from f***ing fear!”
Eventually the law catches up with them and every member of The French 75 must go into hiding. With this shift, the film moves into a full-blown fugitive thriller. The search, led by Sean Penn’s Col. Steven J. Lockjaw is relentless. It is this pursuit that occupies the majority of the film, and it is undeniably compelling and well-crafted.
What is less well-crafted, however, is the film’s portrayal of the enemy.
The military, the federal government, the police – they’re all portrayed as tools of a fascist, white nationalist system. As Lockjaw pursues the French 75, his distaste for due process is evident as he regularly murders former members in their homes. The team he leads, who all wear ambiguous “POLICE” markers though they appear dressed and armed for a foreign war, intimidate minors, break into buildings, and even threaten nuns.
It doesn’t end there, though. Tied into the government is a secret white supremacist organization called “The Christmas Adventurers Club.” Lockjaw is under consideration for membership, and as part of the interview process, we hear various questions aimed at making sure Lockjaw sees other races as inferior. This creepy group begins their meetings with, “Merry Christmas, Hail Saint Nick” and unfortunately has an Alabama connection in their leader, an elderly man named Roy Moore.
Like real terrorist organizations, The French 75 here need to believe that those they fight are fully and unambiguously evil.
“One Battle After Another” gives them that enemy. In doing so, it gives viewers reason to support their violence, to want a revolution as well.
Such a depiction of who is in power and how our military, police, and government operate, of course, is not an accurate representation of reality. But by presenting them this way, as unfair, morally bankrupt, and intent on violent subjugation, “One Battle After Another” betrays an important truth about the stories we tell about our enemies.
To fight other human beings – who are made in the image of God just as we are – by all means necessary, we must believe the worst about them. We must ignore the nuance, the moral complexity, and the fact that we might not know the whole story.
To be clear, sometimes evil is just that, evil. “One Battle After Another,” however, shows us that it is just too easy to flatten our enemies and convince ourselves that we are justified in our actions when we are not.
This is likely not the intended lesson of the filmmakers.
Parker Snider is a minister and writer based in Birmingham. Before entering ministry, he worked in policy and communications at both the state and national level. A lifelong movie fan, Snider writes here about film, exploring what on-screen stories reveal about the off-screen world.
This culture article was made possible by The Fred & Rheta Skelton Center for Cultural Renewal, a project of 1819 News. To comment on this article, please email [email protected]. The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News.
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