As our world reels with stress from fear and mismanagement, humanity must not lose her most beautiful attribute. Whether it's the open slaughter of turkeys, the horrors of war, Prop 8, or trampling a person to death for a Wal-Mart Christmas gift, Americans are losing their 250-year-old talent for empathy. Fear, greed, a population out of control and self-righteousness are throwing our penchant for compassion off-track.
Violence is everywhere. Video games, film, 24-hour news, and an administration out of control have turned horror into excitement, gunshots into victory, and torture into the American way. Today a revolver on a film poster implies must-see action. Progressive screenwriting has taken a backseat to gratuitous violence.
Americans are getting the subliminal message. Despite the slumping economy, gun sales continue to be brisk. Even Beverly Hills' most prominent merchant, Bijan, has made a killing from glamorous jewel-encrusted, mink-encased guns. No one is minding the store that sells America its culture of violence.
1961's "The Misfits" stars Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, Montgomery Clift and Eli Wallach. It tells the story of a young lost divorcee, Roslyn Tabor (Monroe), who looks for a glimmer of beauty in the stark world of the dying Wild West. She's come to Reno for quickie divorce and a reason to hope. Soon she's riding the trails with the craggy Gay Langland (Gable). Optimism sparks in her eyes, and the viewer can only feel happy that she's found her home.
Soon the sharp reality of brutality assaults her dry, Nevada world. Guido (Wallach) was a bombardier during WWII, he's haunted by the unseen "puppy dogs and mail carriers" that he has incinerated. Guido says, "Dropping a bomb is like telling a lie. It makes everything smooth and quiet, pretty soon you don't hear anything, see anything." He continues, "You care. Whatever happens to anybody it happens to you. You're really hooked into the whole thing, Roslyn. It's a blessing."
Monroe's aura inspired Arthur Miller to write this eye-opening script. Director John Huston utilizes Monroe's personal pain to its fullest. She was in and out of rehab during the films production; her emotions were never more raw. It's the end of 1950's innocence when she begs, pleads, and screams for mercy upon the misfit horses that they have come to slaughter.
In scene after scene, via innuendo or thorough wailing dialogue, Monroe is crying out for us to know what is most important to her and should be to us. In "The Misfits" Monroe literally slams the door on Marilyn Monroe's own 1950's pinup pictures that hang on the inside of Gay's locker door -- as if to say, "this silliness was something important that I've now grown to know as virtually meaningless. This here, now, is what I've come to know is important, and I want to share it with the world." Gable himself said, "This is the best picture I have made, and it's the only time I've been able to act." The man who was the face of Hollywood's golden age ended his career with this film, as did Monroe.
This hard view of America is impossible to watch without turning away. Miller's vision shows, that without the generosity of kindness, humanity will lose its better tomorrow. When Sarah Palin said "No worries" about the backdrop in her turkey interview video, she proved that whatever innocence and insight she had found in her at church or at home, was nothing more than a hypocritical lie.
As we begin to send out our annual greetings for "Peace on Earth, goodwill toward men," it's prudent to remember that God or no God, the ability to place yourself in another being's predicament is all that you need to stay one step ahead of the mass of humanity. If Hollywood would only put the guns aside, or at least get them off the posters, America might become a more gentle, peaceful, and empathetic place.