[00:00:03.04]
[indistinct chatter]

[00:00:11.01]
[dramatic instrumental music]

[00:00:26.01]
- [Director] Guys, coming up.

[00:00:28.02]
- [Man] What are you looking for?

[00:00:30.02]
- [Director] Action!

[00:00:31.05]
- [Wayne Kyle] There are
three types of people

[00:00:32.03]
in this world,

[00:00:34.07]
sheep, wolves, and sheepdogs.

[00:00:38.06]
Some people prefer to believe that

[00:00:41.03]
evil doesn't exist in the world,

[00:00:43.05]
and if it ever darkened their doorstep

[00:00:45.04]
they wouldn't know how
to protect themselves.

[00:00:47.08]
Those are the sheep.

[00:00:50.05]
And then you got predators.

[00:00:52.05]
They use violence to pray on the weak.

[00:00:55.04]
They the wolves.
[children yelling]

[00:00:58.03]
And then there are those who've

[00:00:59.09]
been blessed with the gift of aggression,

[00:01:02.03]
and an overpowering need
to protect the flock.

[00:01:04.06]
[children yelling]

[00:01:07.00]
These men are the rare breed,

[00:01:08.06]
live to confront the wolf.

[00:01:12.05]
They are the sheepdog.

[00:01:15.04]
- [Navy Doctor] Would you
be surprised if I told you

[00:01:16.09]
that the Navy has credited you with

[00:01:19.07]
over 160 kills?

[00:01:21.02]
[gunshots]
[glass shattering]

[00:01:23.05]
- [Chris Kyle] I was
just protecting my guys.

[00:01:24.08]
They were trying to kill our soldiers.

[00:01:26.07]
The thing that haunts me are all the guys

[00:01:29.08]
that I couldn't save.

[00:01:31.05]
- Your dad, he's a hero.

[00:01:34.02]
[dramatic orchestral music]

[00:01:42.01]
- I think we're about fixing to get into

[00:01:43.02]
a pretty big gun fight.

[00:01:44.08]
[dramatic music continues]

[00:01:47.06]
[distant gunshots]

[00:01:49.06]
[gunshots]

[00:01:59.03]
[loud explosions]

[00:02:02.00]
- [Reed] What's the best way to go about

[00:02:04.05]
disarming one of these?

[00:02:07.07]
- The way you don't die, sir.

[00:02:09.05]
Got him.
[explosion]

[00:02:11.00]
- [Norm] Can't begin to imagine

[00:02:11.09]
what you went through personally.

[00:02:14.09]
- [Billy] Thank you for saying that, sir.

[00:02:16.05]
- [Norm] Being celebrated as a hero,

[00:02:19.01]
that's gotta weigh heavy
on a young man's shoulders.

[00:02:22.02]
- Makes me feel like I've
got no say in things, sir.

[00:02:25.02]
- I sympathize. But your story, Billy,

[00:02:29.06]
you gotta understand it
no longer belongs to you.

[00:02:32.05]
It's America's story now.

[00:02:34.07]
- [Director 2] Cut!

[00:02:38.00]
- [Narrator 1] For
millions around the globe,

[00:02:39.04]
the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan

[00:02:41.03]
have become America's story.

[00:02:43.02]
Films like "American
Sniper," "Lone Survivor"

[00:02:46.00]
and "The Hurt Locker" have
played a substantial role

[00:02:48.05]
in how people came to understand

[00:02:50.04]
and remember these conflicts.

[00:02:52.02]
Not just for those who lived
through them at the time,

[00:02:54.06]
but for generations to come.

[00:02:56.06]
But what of films about the
wars in Iraq and Afghanistan

[00:02:59.03]
made outside of the United States?

[00:03:01.06]
What of those stories told
by French, Polish, Italian

[00:03:05.04]
or Danish filmmakers,

[00:03:07.05]
or of course the Iraqis
and Afghans themselves?

[00:03:10.07]
How might these films contribute
to a greater understanding

[00:03:13.09]
of how the conflicts came to be viewed

[00:03:15.07]
by cultures around the world,

[00:03:17.04]
so that the narrative
of what many refer to

[00:03:20.00]
as the 9/11 Wars is no
longer America's story,

[00:03:23.01]
but a truly global one?

[00:03:24.06]
[dramatic duduk music]

[00:03:56.09]
[dog barking]

[00:03:59.00]
[suspenseful percussion]

[00:04:01.09]
[dog barking]
[dog whimpering]

[00:04:03.08]
[percussion continues]

[00:04:10.00]
- Just at the moment that
cinema's beginning, right,

[00:04:11.07]
that's the very moment
of cinema's emergence,

[00:04:13.08]
and it immediately starts to picture

[00:04:16.01]
American military strength and might

[00:04:18.05]
at the very same time that that military

[00:04:20.04]
is becoming newly professionalized.

[00:04:22.04]
So you see some of these early actualities

[00:04:24.07]
with the Spanish American War.

[00:04:26.01]
They're often just simple pans across

[00:04:28.06]
the majestic gunboat

[00:04:31.01]
or a huge big steel gunship,

[00:04:33.04]
and they're a display of technology,

[00:04:34.06]
they're a display of military
power and technology.

[00:04:37.04]
- American war cinema is, by definition,

[00:04:44.01]
a presentation and projection
of the American mind.

[00:04:48.04]
Of course, most people
don't read books on history,

[00:04:53.07]
so film is extremely important
in shaping the consciousness

[00:05:00.02]
and positioning of most
people in the world.

[00:05:05.00]
That's why, you know,

[00:05:06.02]
film is not just about making something

[00:05:10.00]
that you identify with

[00:05:11.08]
and you laugh or you cry,
or you enjoy yourself

[00:05:15.07]
because you like the characters.

[00:05:17.09]
It is projecting a greater background,

[00:05:21.05]
greater narratives,

[00:05:23.05]
national and sometimes
universal narratives about war.

[00:05:28.08]
[plane engine whirring]

[00:05:34.03]
- What, sir?

[00:05:43.07]
- Earn this.

[00:05:49.06]
Earn it.

[00:05:54.08]
- These liaison officers
that work in the Pentagon

[00:05:57.01]
or the CIA

[00:05:57.09]
whose specific job is to vet scripts

[00:06:01.04]
and make sure that these
scripts are broadly consistent

[00:06:04.00]
with the image that the military

[00:06:05.04]
wants to present of itself

[00:06:06.08]
or these particular
institutions like the CIA.

[00:06:09.07]
And at that point they
will, of course, yeah,

[00:06:11.06]
lend you materials or
support in some respects

[00:06:13.09]
if it's broadly consistent
with the worldview

[00:06:16.01]
that they would like to articulate.

[00:06:18.04]
If it isn't consistent
with that worldview,

[00:06:20.00]
and if it's critical
of American imperialism

[00:06:21.06]
or American efforts to shape
the world in its own image,

[00:06:23.09]
then you don't get the support.

[00:06:25.08]
Classic example of that
is "Zero Dark Thirty."

[00:06:27.08]
We have memos back and forth

[00:06:29.00]
between the filmmakers and the CIA

[00:06:31.01]
which document the close relationship

[00:06:33.07]
and the efforts of the CIA

[00:06:35.06]
to shape it's image in filmic terms.

[00:06:40.06]
So here's an institution which
is shaping the representation

[00:06:44.00]
of the War on Terror,
particularly around torture.

[00:06:47.06]
- I own you, Amar.

[00:06:50.00]
You belong to me.

[00:06:54.02]
Look at me.

[00:06:58.05]
You don't look at me when I talk to you,

[00:06:59.08]
I hurt you!

[00:07:01.03]
You step off this mat,

[00:07:02.05]
I hurt you!

[00:07:03.08]
If you lie to me,

[00:07:04.07]
I'm gonna hurt you!

[00:07:05.06]
Now! Now, look at me!

[00:07:09.02]
Look at me, Amar!

[00:07:11.06]
- I wanted to...

[00:07:13.08]
put the audience into the
center of this particular hunt,

[00:07:17.04]
so you feel not just
that you're watching it

[00:07:19.08]
but you're inside it,

[00:07:21.03]
and you're in the marketplace

[00:07:23.00]
and you're going around the, you know,

[00:07:25.01]
in the van going around
trying to track the Potohar.

[00:07:29.02]
So I think that that sort of immediacy

[00:07:33.01]
creates a kind of, I
suppose, a kind of tension

[00:07:36.06]
that is good for a story
that's so realistic.

[00:07:39.07]
- Usually movies, particularly
by very highly credentialed

[00:07:42.09]
producers, directors, and casts,

[00:07:45.06]
does have an effect on public opinion,

[00:07:48.01]
not only in the United States

[00:07:49.08]
but around the world.

[00:07:51.03]
First of all, the brutality depicted there

[00:07:54.01]
is very disturbing.

[00:07:56.01]
But the thing that we, Senator
Levin and Senator Feinstein

[00:07:59.04]
focused on is that you believe
when watching this movie

[00:08:03.04]
that waterboarding and
torture leads to information

[00:08:07.03]
that leads then to the
elimination of Osama bin Laden.

[00:08:11.05]
That's not the case.

[00:08:13.01]
The moral of the story is
that torture does not work.

[00:08:17.04]
It is hateful.

[00:08:18.03]
It is a harmful--

[00:08:19.07]
incredibly harmful to the
United States of America--

[00:08:22.06]
and to somehow make people
believe that it was responsible

[00:08:25.08]
for the elimination of Osama bin Laden

[00:08:28.06]
is in my view unacceptable.

[00:08:31.06]
- If this is

[00:08:34.01]
obviously something that's
a controversial issue,

[00:08:37.07]
which it is,

[00:08:39.04]
a healthy debate I think
is helpful, you know.

[00:08:43.06]
And so if the film has stimulated
a debate, a conversation

[00:08:46.05]
about something that's very important

[00:08:51.05]
and, you know, elements that were done

[00:08:54.05]
in the name of finding bin Laden,

[00:08:56.04]
then I think it's a real testament

[00:08:59.01]
to the power of the medium.

[00:09:00.08]
- Here's a film that
justifies that torture,

[00:09:04.00]
and in justifying that torture

[00:09:06.00]
takes leave from the historical record

[00:09:07.06]
to shape opinion about the practices

[00:09:11.08]
of the War on Terror, torture,

[00:09:14.02]
and broadly speaking, its
core of American interests.

[00:09:26.01]
- The winner is Oliver Stone, "Platoon"!

[00:09:29.09]
[audience cheering]

[00:09:33.01]
- Thank you.

[00:09:33.09]
Thank you for this Cinderella ending.

[00:09:36.05]
But I think that through this award,

[00:09:38.01]
you're really acknowledging
the Vietnam veteran.

[00:09:40.07]
And I think what you're saying
is that for the first time,

[00:09:44.00]
you really understand
what happened over there.

[00:09:46.07]
And I think what you're saying is that

[00:09:48.03]
it should never, ever in
our lifetimes happen again.

[00:09:52.08]
- The movie was in a
sense about my struggle

[00:09:55.03]
to keep my own humanity going

[00:09:59.00]
and-- or call it a soul.

[00:10:02.01]
The odyssey of Charlie
Sheen in the movie becomes

[00:10:04.07]
this struggle for his soul.

[00:10:07.01]
[indistinct radio chatter]

[00:10:12.08]
[rapid gunfire]

[00:10:16.04]
[melancholy orchestral music]

[00:10:32.07]
- [Man in Film] Hold
your armor. Guns! Guns!

[00:10:34.01]
Pull off! Pull off!

[00:10:35.02]
We're trying to cover it on my side!

[00:10:38.06]
- When "Platoon" was first released,

[00:10:40.03]
a number of people asked me,

[00:10:42.05]
"Was the war really like that?"

[00:10:46.02]
I mean, I never found an answer because

[00:10:48.07]
what really happened is,

[00:10:50.09]
it's now so thoroughly mixed up in my mind

[00:10:53.05]
with what people said happened

[00:10:58.02]
that the real experience,

[00:11:01.03]
it's no longer there.

[00:11:03.01]
[helicopter blades whirring]

[00:11:04.05]
- [Narrator 1] If war
films can be so influential

[00:11:06.04]
to those who encountered
a conflict firsthand,

[00:11:09.00]
like William Adams, what
might their impact be

[00:11:11.06]
on those who only ever
experience war vicariously

[00:11:14.02]
through the media?

[00:11:15.07]
The war film possesses a
tremendous power to move audiences

[00:11:19.04]
and influence their
understanding of conflicts

[00:11:21.08]
in ways which move beyond the screen.

[00:11:29.05]
[wolves growling]

[00:11:31.03]
[dramatic instrumental music]

[00:11:38.00]
- [Narrator 2] "Pause and
visualize the real Arab.

[00:11:39.09]
"What do you see?

[00:11:41.02]
"Black beard, headdress, dark sunglasses.

[00:11:44.05]
"In the background-- a limousine,

[00:11:46.03]
"harem maidens, oil wells, camels.

[00:11:50.00]
"Or perhaps he is brandishing
an automatic weapon,

[00:11:52.07]
"crazy hate in his eyes

[00:11:54.01]
"and Allah on his lips.

[00:11:56.04]
"Can you see him?"

[00:12:01.05]
- Americans are actually finding

[00:12:04.03]
what they want to find there.

[00:12:06.04]
What they want to find is a desert,

[00:12:09.05]
the intensity of hate towards them,

[00:12:14.04]
and the beginning of "Hurt
Locker" does exactly that.

[00:12:17.07]
Within two minutes of the
beginning of the film,

[00:12:20.09]
it becomes clear that
you cannot trust anyone.

[00:12:24.02]
When looking through the
gun site at the Iraqis,

[00:12:28.05]
what we get is you never can trust an Arab

[00:12:33.04]
and the enemy could be anybody.

[00:12:35.02]
It could be those workers
watching you from the roof.

[00:12:39.05]
It could be children walking by.

[00:12:42.00]
It could be the shepherd.

[00:12:44.02]
It could be the man in the butchery.

[00:12:47.07]
You are in enemy country,

[00:12:49.09]
and everybody is and could be an enemy.

[00:12:56.03]
[loud explosion]

[00:12:58.04]
- So "American Sniper"
is key to some of this.

[00:13:00.06]
I mean, it's an extraordinary movie,

[00:13:01.08]
and straightforwardly
almost kind of fascist film

[00:13:04.04]
in some respects in
terms of its articulation

[00:13:07.00]
of the savagery of this racialized "other"

[00:13:10.02]
that must somehow be
policed by the, you know,

[00:13:14.00]
white savior nation, the United States.

[00:13:16.06]
I think there's a connection

[00:13:17.06]
between some of these
representations of the War on Terror

[00:13:21.07]
and the slow rise of
new forms of nationalism

[00:13:25.05]
that were formed sort
of between, you know,

[00:13:27.08]
2001 and 2016, let's say--

[00:13:30.05]
an increasing sense of a kind
of American exceptionalism

[00:13:33.00]
through this sense of a savage "other"

[00:13:35.06]
outside there in the rest of the world,

[00:13:38.04]
these Islamic fanatics who
aren't really ever humanized

[00:13:41.02]
or thought carefully about
in any of these films,

[00:13:43.09]
but imagined-- particularly
in "American Sniper"--

[00:13:46.03]
simply as savages, a word that's
actually used in the film.

[00:13:49.05]
- These are savages.
- Chris.

[00:13:51.01]
- Babe, they're fucking savages.

[00:13:52.06]
- Bunch of savages, isn't it?

[00:13:54.03]
- Bloody savages.

[00:13:55.04]
- They're savages here, one and all.

[00:13:58.01]
Leave them to go back
to slaughtering babes

[00:13:59.09]
and playing stick-and-ball
with one another's head.

[00:14:02.00]
- Savages!

[00:14:05.08]
- That's my wife, Yakima, my squaw.

[00:14:08.02]
- Yes, but she's...she's savage!

[00:14:11.00]
- Put fear of God into the savages.

[00:14:13.07]
- I've done got me 157 dead gooks killed.

[00:14:19.02]
- We got gooks in the fucking perimeter.

[00:14:20.09]
- God damn village Vin Drin Dop, or Lop.

[00:14:25.07]
Dmn gook names all sound the same.

[00:14:28.02]
- You wouldn't have done that

[00:14:29.01]
if that was a white boy back there.

[00:14:30.08]
Yeah, but to you he's
nothing but a gook, huh?

[00:14:32.09]
I mean, he's just a yellow nigger.

[00:14:34.01]
- He is the enemy.

[00:14:35.00]
- No, you are the enemy!

[00:14:36.05]
- I don't want to hear "dune coon"

[00:14:37.06]
or "sand nigger" from him or anybody else.

[00:14:40.01]
- [Conrad] Captain uses those terms.

[00:14:42.04]
- Look, the point is, Conrad,

[00:14:43.07]
that "towel head" and "camel jockey"

[00:14:44.06]
are perfectly good substitutes.

[00:14:46.05]
- And the second that they run down there,

[00:14:47.08]
we got 200 hajis on our back.

[00:14:50.07]
- Dude, you bought it from savages.

[00:14:53.07]
- Who are the bad guys?

[00:14:57.06]
- The ones with the beards.

[00:15:04.00]
- [Tucker Carlson] Iraq is a crappy place,

[00:15:05.04]
filled with a bunch of, you know,

[00:15:06.09]
semi-literate primitive monkeys.

[00:15:09.06]
But I just have zero sympathy
for them or their culture,

[00:15:13.01]
a culture where people just
don't use toilet paper or forks.

[00:15:16.08]
- [Co-Host] And the way they treat women,

[00:15:17.07]
you know, I agree with you.

[00:15:18.07]
Their culture is--

[00:15:19.09]
but you're in their homeland,

[00:15:22.00]
and you're over there as
an American, who they hate,

[00:15:24.07]
and they want nothing more

[00:15:25.06]
than the Americans off of their soil.

[00:15:27.01]
So they're not gonna play games.

[00:15:28.01]
- [Tucker] Yeah but then
the second we-- I mean,

[00:15:29.02]
they can just the shut the
fuck up and obey, is my view.

[00:15:33.01]
- I've always been in love
with the genre, the war genre,

[00:15:35.04]
since I was a kid.

[00:15:36.04]
Movies like "The Deer
Hunter" and "Apocalypse Now"

[00:15:38.09]
and "Platoon" were things
that always resonated with me,

[00:15:42.00]
and I was always obsessed
with the plight of a soldier

[00:15:44.06]
when I was a kid.

[00:15:45.07]
I was just hoping that it
really would be a movie

[00:15:48.01]
seen for what it was,
at least intended to be,

[00:15:50.01]
which was a movie about
soldiers and their families.

[00:15:52.07]
That's it.

[00:15:56.06]
- A new movie that
opened tonight in Europe

[00:15:58.04]
is creating an uproar.

[00:16:00.02]
It's called "Valley Of The Wolves: Iraq."

[00:16:03.08]
Now, here's the plot to the movie.

[00:16:06.05]
U.S. soldiers attack a
wedding party in Iraq.

[00:16:10.00]
They drag prisoners off to Abu Ghraib.

[00:16:12.08]
Critics are calling it one of the worst

[00:16:15.00]
anti-American propaganda films ever.

[00:16:18.03]
If that's par for the course
for the way they think

[00:16:20.07]
that explains why you have
people running airplanes

[00:16:25.01]
into buildings in America.

[00:16:26.08]
- Over there, they take
the uncivilized approach

[00:16:30.04]
and then they wonder why so many people

[00:16:32.06]
don't trust the Muslims
when it comes to liberty.

[00:16:34.08]
- So do you have any problem
with Billy Zane and Gary Busey

[00:16:37.02]
being in a movie that's so anti-American

[00:16:39.09]
that our troops are being ordered

[00:16:41.02]
to stay away from movie
theaters showing it

[00:16:43.06]
because they're afraid
that American troops

[00:16:45.06]
may be injured or killed?

[00:16:47.04]
- The film has been regarded
a response to Americans

[00:16:53.00]
and because of what has
been known as a Hood event

[00:16:58.05]
in Turkey, where I think
11 Turkish soldiers

[00:17:04.01]
were detained by American soldiers

[00:17:08.05]
because of, allegedly,

[00:17:12.09]
plotting an assassination
against a Kurdish leader,

[00:17:16.00]
which had been considered a humiliation

[00:17:20.06]
for the Turkish nation,

[00:17:21.07]
not only for the Kurdish
soldiers themselves.

[00:17:24.06]
So what Polat Alemdar does in this film

[00:17:28.04]
is to take revenge of
that event and sort of

[00:17:33.00]
re-establish the pride
of the Turkish nation

[00:17:37.07]
through humiliating the
American soldiers in return

[00:17:41.04]
and killing them.

[00:18:01.07]
- Unlike other anti-American film,

[00:18:04.02]
we have a paramilitary hero
rather than a military hero,

[00:18:08.02]
fighting against American soldiers

[00:18:10.06]
and sort of re-establishing
the order within the region.

[00:18:15.08]
Definitely it's a
national fantasy, sort of,

[00:18:19.08]
as I've said before,
re-establishing the order

[00:18:23.06]
or the humiliation that
Turkish nation felt

[00:18:27.07]
over the Hood event.

[00:18:30.06]
So in reality, neither Turkish government

[00:18:33.04]
nor the officials have done
something regarding this event.

[00:18:38.08]
So the film filled that need,

[00:18:44.01]
satisfied that need felt
by the public, and sort of

[00:18:51.01]
also implicitly reviving fantasies

[00:18:56.05]
of an imperial power.

[00:19:01.03]
[dramatic instrumental music]

[00:19:09.07]
[speaking Chinese dialect]

[00:19:13.05]
- I think there's a propagandistic cycle

[00:19:15.08]
that's emerging from China,
and that's clearly connected

[00:19:19.06]
to the rise of China as a global power--

[00:19:23.02]
directly connected to
a kind of articulation

[00:19:25.09]
of military strength,

[00:19:27.03]
and a kind of military strength globally

[00:19:29.05]
in these "Wolf Warrior"
and "Wolf Warrior 2" films,

[00:19:32.00]
an articulation of the
power of the Chinese state

[00:19:34.09]
to manage its populations,

[00:19:37.01]
to save its population abroad,

[00:19:39.00]
which is directly keyed to
the goals of the Chinese State

[00:19:43.03]
to expand its military--

[00:19:44.07]
particularly to expand its Naval forces,

[00:19:46.07]
to protect the South China Seas

[00:19:49.02]
and as part of a global strategy of growth

[00:19:53.07]
and of a creation of a superpower.

[00:19:56.04]
So film is playing a role

[00:19:59.00]
in the articulation of
Chinese military strength

[00:20:03.05]
as a symbol of Chinese economic strength.

[00:20:07.09]
[sheep bleating]
[conversing in Arabic dialect]

[00:20:14.09]
[dramatic instrumental music]

[00:20:21.09]
- [Narrator 1] Films made
in Iraq and Afghanistan

[00:20:24.02]
do not have the budget or resources

[00:20:26.00]
of those made in the
United States or China.

[00:20:29.02]
The experiences these
countries have had of war

[00:20:31.08]
are not those fought
thousands of miles away

[00:20:33.08]
by heavily armed soldiers,

[00:20:35.06]
but in their own country, their own cities

[00:20:38.04]
and their own communities.

[00:20:41.00]
As a result, their narratives
tend to center around

[00:20:44.03]
the civilians that American
films push to the margins

[00:20:47.04]
or erase entirely.

[00:20:49.04]
Filmmakers like Mohamed
Al-Daradji and Shawkat Amin Korki

[00:20:53.06]
provide an insight into a war far removed

[00:20:56.01]
from that portrayed in American films,

[00:20:58.06]
one that's hardly ever seen
by audiences in the west.

[00:21:03.02]
[speaking in Kurdish dialect]

[00:21:09.06]
[woman crying]

[00:21:18.00]
[speaking in Arabic dialect]

[00:21:43.09]
- We are going through a difficult time,

[00:21:46.01]
but we are beautiful human being--

[00:21:47.08]
we have normal life, and
we have normal activity

[00:21:51.05]
and we have normal joy.

[00:21:53.04]
And we are looking to have a joy in life.

[00:21:56.04]
You know, those children, you know,

[00:21:58.01]
I always make film
about women and children

[00:22:01.05]
'cause they are the victim.

[00:22:02.07]
[dramatic instrumental music]
[train horn blaring]

[00:22:08.05]
[speaking in Arabic dialect]

[00:22:12.00]
- The winner...

[00:22:15.09]
"Memories on Stone."

[00:22:17.09]
[audience applauds]

[00:22:18.08]
- I would like to dedicate this award

[00:22:23.05]
to my people in Kurdistan,

[00:22:26.00]
which are in a new,

[00:22:29.03]
tragic,

[00:22:31.00]
bloody situation with ISIS.

[00:22:34.01]
[woman screaming]

[00:22:37.04]
- The Iraqis never presented
any threat to this country.

[00:22:41.03]
And if we leave, those Iraqis

[00:22:43.07]
don't present any threat to
this country after we leave,

[00:22:46.06]
'cause they're not, you know,

[00:22:47.06]
they're not some evil caricature

[00:22:48.09]
like you've seen in the
films and all that stuff.

[00:22:50.09]
They're people.

[00:22:52.02]
They have mothers, they have fathers.

[00:22:54.00]
They have sisters, they have brothers,

[00:22:55.05]
they have children, you know.

[00:22:57.04]
There's people that love them

[00:22:58.04]
just like there's people
that love you, you know.

[00:23:00.09]
And those people grieve
when they lose them,

[00:23:04.00]
just like people grieve if
they lose you, you know.

[00:23:09.07]
That's maybe not as dramatic
and as exciting, you know,

[00:23:13.01]
and clear cut, you know,

[00:23:15.06]
and easy to understand as, you know,

[00:23:19.08]
this sort of simple binary
world of good and evil

[00:23:22.00]
that you get painted for you,

[00:23:23.04]
but that's not the way the real world is.

[00:23:27.08]
- We tend to have more memorial sites now

[00:23:29.03]
than we have monuments,

[00:23:30.06]
and I think those two
terms are often attached

[00:23:33.07]
to two different functions
we ascribe to these sites.

[00:23:37.03]
There's a kind of didactic role.

[00:23:39.00]
There's a sense that monuments,
memorials are intended

[00:23:42.03]
to teach us something about the past

[00:23:46.03]
or intended to instruct us

[00:23:48.02]
and often to teach us a better
kind of national history,

[00:23:51.05]
and usually from the point
of trying to, in some ways,

[00:23:55.00]
instill a certain kind of reverence

[00:23:57.01]
or appreciation for a
kind of national history.

[00:23:59.07]
Now we have much more memorials,

[00:24:01.02]
and memorials tend to
be therapeutic places.

[00:24:04.08]
They play a therapeutic role,
they're sites of encountering,

[00:24:09.04]
but also often alleviating,
hopefully, trauma.

[00:24:15.05]
- I think film and media generally

[00:24:17.02]
is straightforwardly projected
military and imperial power

[00:24:20.06]
across history, in many respects

[00:24:22.03]
as sort of other forms of visual culture

[00:24:23.09]
and symbolic culture statues do the same.

[00:24:26.06]
There's a whole series of
visual artifacts, shall we say,

[00:24:30.04]
that celebrate the military might

[00:24:33.02]
and the power of the
state itself frequently.

[00:24:36.01]
Film is part of that, right?

[00:24:37.01]
Film in a sense is the modern version

[00:24:38.05]
of a statue in that sense,
it seems to me regularly,

[00:24:41.02]
that it is a visual correlate

[00:24:42.09]
to those forms of
memorializing military power.

[00:24:48.08]
[suspenseful instrumental music]

[00:24:55.05]
- Now...

[00:24:59.05]
the German army controls every French port

[00:25:02.03]
except Dunkirk, here,

[00:25:03.04]
and Calais here to the west.

[00:25:06.08]
- "Dunkirk" is a really interesting film

[00:25:09.00]
for a number of reasons.

[00:25:10.06]
For me, most prominently
amongst those is that

[00:25:14.01]
it offers the spectator a unique position

[00:25:17.01]
from which to understand the war film.

[00:25:19.06]
It puts them right in the shoes

[00:25:21.07]
of those who were on the beaches

[00:25:23.07]
and gives the audience some sense

[00:25:26.06]
of the sensory experience of war.

[00:25:29.01]
So "Dunkirk" is, to some extent,

[00:25:31.09]
a product of the culture
within which it's made.

[00:25:35.00]
Although I think that
some of those assumptions

[00:25:38.07]
about its connections to British identity

[00:25:41.07]
are exaggerated within the popular press

[00:25:45.02]
and by politicians to a
large extent, as well.

[00:25:48.05]
Most famously, the UKIP
leader Nigel Farage

[00:25:52.01]
posted a picture of himself on Twitter

[00:25:55.02]
in front of the poster for "Dunkirk,"

[00:25:58.03]
advocating that young people
should go and see the film.

[00:26:01.03]
And I think that gives
some indication of the

[00:26:04.07]
level of cultural impact
that the film has had.

[00:26:08.07]
- A nostalgic moment that
happened briefly there

[00:26:11.07]
with "Dunkirk"

[00:26:12.05]
and maybe some of the Churchill movies

[00:26:14.02]
that came out at the same time,

[00:26:15.09]
a sort of sense of a nostalgic Britain

[00:26:20.06]
that did beat the Germans
in the second World War.

[00:26:24.00]
This of course is a constant
screen memory in Britain.

[00:26:26.05]
Britain spends a lot
of time thinking about

[00:26:28.06]
how it beat the fascist
during second World War.

[00:26:30.06]
It spends very little time thinking about

[00:26:32.02]
how it was the fascist for the rest of the

[00:26:34.06]
19th and 20th century, how
it was an imperial power

[00:26:37.02]
and how it used military
might and media might

[00:26:40.05]
to foster that imperialism.

[00:26:42.01]
But it does make a lot of films about how

[00:26:43.07]
plucky Britain beat the fascists.

[00:26:48.06]
- [Narrator 2] "Though
wars continue to be fought

[00:26:50.02]
"and won or lost on the battlefield,

[00:26:52.02]
"they also continue to
be fought and won or lost

[00:26:54.07]
"through their representation

[00:26:55.08]
"on the movie or television screen.

[00:26:58.02]
"Images of war explain why we fight;

[00:27:00.06]
"they stage and restage wars battles;

[00:27:03.00]
"and they attempt to
explain why we won or lost.

[00:27:06.07]
"In other words,

[00:27:07.05]
"all contemporary wars
are waged on two fronts--

[00:27:10.01]
"on the battlefield and on the screen."

[00:27:17.08]
- Don't look at the camera.

[00:27:18.08]
Don't look at the camera!

[00:27:19.07]
Just go by like you're fighting!

[00:27:21.05]
Like you're fighting!

[00:27:22.03]
Don't look at the camera!

[00:27:23.03]
It's for television!

[00:27:24.05]
Just go through, go through!

[00:27:25.09]
Just go by, keep on going...

[00:27:27.01]
[helicopter blades whirring]

[00:27:29.04]
- [Narrator 1] Such is the
effective power of the medium.

[00:27:32.03]
American films about its wars,

[00:27:34.04]
whether based on real
life or fictional stories,

[00:27:37.04]
have frequently turned to the cinema,

[00:27:39.02]
secure in the knowledge that
generations of young men

[00:27:42.00]
and women have had the idea of what war is

[00:27:45.02]
formed and defined by what
they've seen on the screen.

[00:27:55.06]
In a similar way, films
from all over the world

[00:27:58.04]
have often not only used
film to represent individual

[00:28:01.02]
and collective trauma,

[00:28:02.07]
but also incorporated
the filmmaking process

[00:28:05.05]
into their narratives.

[00:28:06.07]
- Action!

[00:28:10.06]
- [Tommy] A story, a man
fires a rifle for many years,

[00:28:16.00]
and he goes to war.

[00:28:18.08]
- [Man 2] The others have forgotten.

[00:28:20.02]
- You're wrong there.

[00:28:22.00]
They aren't forgotten
because they haven't died.

[00:28:24.09]
They're living, right out there,

[00:28:28.01]
Collingwood and the rest.

[00:28:29.07]
And they'll keep on living

[00:28:30.07]
as long as the regiment lives.

[00:28:33.01]
- [Tommy] Every war is different.

[00:28:35.04]
Every war is the same.

[00:28:38.02]
- They'll be horse meat
before this campaign is over.

[00:28:42.09]
- [Tommy] We are still in the desert.

[00:28:47.02]
- [Narrator 1] Films,
then, play a central role

[00:28:49.00]
in how cultures come to understand

[00:28:50.07]
the conflicts in which they participate.

[00:28:53.04]
They have done so since
the birth of the medium,

[00:28:55.09]
and will continue to do so

[00:28:57.06]
as long as we turn to the screen

[00:28:59.01]
to make sense of the world around us.

[00:29:02.09]
[solemn orchestral music]