Red State – Douglas Ernst Blog

silent bob silent jihad — Silent Bob goes silent on jihad because it's easier to make fun of Christians (they tend not to murder you in broad daylight when they're offended).

Imagine if you will, a scenario where director Kevin Smith releases his indie horror film, Red State, in March of 2011. Inspired by the infamous Westboro Baptist Church and the cultish followers of Fred Phelps, it causes quite a stir. One day as Smith walks the streets of Santa Monica, California after one of his popular podcasts an enraged Christian slits his throat and leaves a note behind, warning Lady Gaga that her advocacy of gay rights has endangered her life.

On the other side of the globe, a director by the name of Theodore Van Gogh releases a documentary titled Submission. Written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, it pulls no punches in its criticism of Islam. Although irate, the Muslim community in the Netherlands essentially shrugs its shoulders, issuing a few press statements and holding a few sparsely-attended boycotts. A Dutch-Moroccan Muslim by the name of Mohammed Bouyeri appears on The Hofstad Network, a Fox News of sorts, where he has a spirited debate with a Dutch version of Bill O’Reilly. No one dies.

If you experienced such a reality it would be time to worry, as it would be apparent that you crossed over into The Twilight Zone.

The reality is this: Theo Van Gogh was murdered by Mohammed Bouyer. An ominous note was left on the stabbed, bullet riddled, and bloody body for Ayaan Hirsi Ali. The Hofstad Network is composed of a group of individuals who would like to behead Hollywood’s inspiration for Social Network, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali requires security guards close at hand. In the United States, however, Christians respond to “art” like Andres Serrano’s Piss Christ with, essentially, a collective grumble.

And that is why Kevin Smith made Red State instead of, say, Islamic State.

Hollywood artists were great at patting themselves on the back for speaking “truth to power” when BushHitler (one word) was in the White House, but the dirty little secret is that their courage generally only rears its head when the power they’re confronting shows absolutely no interest in sending them off to gulags (i.e., North Korea), stoning them (e.g., Iran), or assassinating them in the vein of Theo Van Gogh. The reason why Kevin Smith is able—by his own admission—to make a movie that is “so fucking vicious and nasty and mean and stark…” is because he lives in the United States of America. The country’s Christian heritage paved the way for the kind of rights Kevin takes for granted. Those same rights he thinks are at risk because of inconsequential nincompoops like Fred Phelps and his followers—so much so that he used his own limited time and resources to make a horror movie about them.

The most puzzling aspect of Kevin Smith’s War on Ostracized Christian Outliers is that he comes from New Jersey. He was a hop, skip, and a jump on 9/11 (a Silent Bob jump, nonetheless) from Ground Zero to see the smoldering rubble, twisted metal, and shattered lives because of the machinations of Islamic terrorists. After comparing that national tragedy with the battle scars left behind by the Catholic outrage over his 1999 movie Dogma (note: there weren’t any), one wonders why he’d return to the Christian-bashing well. Fear and cowardice have already been mentioned. The other — desperation.

Kevin Smith needs a hit. Badly. Even his stronger offerings in recent years (Zack and Miri Make a Porno, Clerks II), while ultimately making the studio money, haven’t been breakout successes. Consider this: Zach and Miri was beaten out its first week by High School Musical 3: Senior Year.

The easiest way for a Hollywood liberal to immediately get fawning coverage is to douse their work in condescension towards the conservative worldview; it’s an accelerant for positive reviews by liberal leaning critics. However, what Hollywood types don’t get is that accelerants are often used to commit arson, and a movie like Red State will most likely leave a big black hole in Kevin’s career—what’s left of it—where conservative fans once stood.

While the knee jerk reaction might be to boycott the kind of tired, predictable, cliched Christian-bashing Kevin Smith offers with Red State, that kind of attention is exactly what he wants. Instead, I wish conservatives would familiarize themselves with the movie and flock to blogs in droves to ask why Kevin Smith keeps playing Silent Bob when it comes to radical Islam.

It turns out that Kevin Smith, director and threat to national security, is moving forward with the long talked about project Red State:

Plot via IMDB: A horror film in which a group of misfits encounter fundamentalism gone to the extreme in Middle America.

Or, as Smith notes of his pet project to paint half the American electorate as Westboro Baptist Church fan club members:

“It’s so f***ing vicious and nasty and mean and stark, and it’s not funny … It’s this weird f***ing dark little Seventies horror movie…that nobody wants to make.”

Note to Kevin: Maybe the reason “nobody want[ed] to make” your film was because conservatives like horror movies just as much as the next guy, and it’s tough to promote a product that says to half the nation: “Watch my movie; it’s one big metaphor showcasing my belief that you’re a monster!”

Or, perhaps, no one was really psyched about making Kevin’s movie

ksmithred — Kevin Smith: Watch my movie because it portrays you as a monster. Is that blood splatter representative of my upcoming movie, or my hemorrhaging career?

because…he’s simply not a very good director. Fact: Kevin Smith is a witty guy who’s quick on his feet, an astute observer of the pop culture landscape, and a capable writer who can turn out gems from time to time—provided he doesn’t stray too far outside his comfort zone. If you remember Cop Out (I think it lasted a few weeks in the theaters and couldn’t even break 50 million domestically, right?), his name was nowhere near the promotional material. When you factor in Kevin’s loyal following is usually worth at least $15 million, and Bruce Willis’ awesomeness should generate another $25 million (minimum), the honest analyst will tell you Cop Out was a stink bomb (bonus points if you got the Mallrats reference).

If Kevin wants to use his talent to cast aspersions on conservatism and the states that are friendly to it, fine. But I find it a little ironic that the liberal guy who actually has what many would call a cult following is now doing a film about extremist cults in the heart of Middle America. Go on any website overrun with Kevin Smith’s fans, offer up some constructive criticism, and watch their heads spin. Even Kevin has shown that he’s so uber sensitive to online critics that he’s willing to write his frustrations into his flicks in the form of teenager and clergy beat-downs… Again, I wouldn’t mind, but this is the same guy who hosts regular pod casts, spouting off his non-expert opinions and ruminations to anyone who will listen.

Note: Liberals are just as prone to the “do as I say, not as I do,” hypocrisy as anyone else. They just don’t want you to know it, because then their racist, redneck, homophobic red herring house of cards will come crumbling down.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go watch Bruce Willis do his thing in a Gorillaz video.

Update: The teaser trailer for Red State is out. For some reason there doesn’t seem to be anyone who practices Sharia Law in it. Perhaps that’s because it would have required courage on Smith’s part…