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Hollywood Ready for Muslim Villains Again? January 30, 2009

Posted by Jehuda in Uncategorized.
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Debbie Schlussel sees the beginnings of a trend after watching Taken. My only issue with her position is that Taken is not exactly Hollywood product, but a French movie posing as Hollywood product.  The French happen to have a very particular attitude towards their highly marginalized Muslim population, after all.

Still, just the fact that Taken is being distributed in the U.S. by one of the major studios is a big step (but it’s Fox, you don’t think Rupert Murdoch had something to do with it?…Nah).

I hope she’s right.  The character of Said in Lost, who is openly depicted as a former Iraqi Republican Guard interrogator (well-versed in torture), could also be seen as part of this liberating trend.  Lost is not a Fox show, by the way.

The stultifying PC approach to the topic of Muslim radicals on the screen – refusing to ever paint them as bad guys – can be irritating (suffice it to say that when Paramount’s screen adaptation of Tom Clancy’s The Sum of All Fears substituted Muslim terrorists with white supremacists I just wanted to puke); but it’s also a muzzle on free expression for which there is no legal recourse.  That’s the worst part about it.

Taken opens today and stars Liam Neeson, Famke Janssen and Maggie Grace (a Lost alumna).