Red State Review

Red State

Year: 2011

Director:  Kevin Smith

Main Actors:  Michael Parks, Melissa Leo, and John Goodman

Red State is a movie about extremes.  On one hand there is the Westboro Baptist Church, which is picketing funerals of gay men and even killing people who they believe are gay.  On the other hand, there is the government.  At first the government does not seem extreme, but they become extreme when they begin to take lives without listening to the people they are killing. Both sides of this story feature a form of extreme and neither side, I do not believe, is right in their extremes.

The first scene featuring the Westboro Baptist Church is when they are picketing the funeral of a gay man.  They are holding signs and causing a disruption of the family’s mourning.  This aspect of the movie is based upon facts.  However, after this scene the viewer finds out that the Church also has weapons.  The three high school boys in the movie decide to visit a prostitute, little do they know that the prostitute was a member of the Church and was tricking them.    The woman drugged them and they woke up in cages at the church.  

The Church twisted God’s commandments to fit what they wanted to do. They believed that gay people deserved to die and they found a way around the do not kill Commandment. This part of the movie reminded me of Animal Farm.  In Animal Farm the animals create their own rules or commandments.  However, the pigs wanted more rights, so to each commandment there was a clause.  That is what this movie showcases; people can take something and twist it to their beliefs, so that to them it is not technically wrong.  Their extremist views cloud their vision and killing a person becomes the righteous thing to do.  

The government also ends up playing an extreme role.  ATF Agents are sent to the scene after the Church kills a member of the local sheriff’s office; on the scene is the sheriff who lost one of his officers.  At first the agents arrive, but they do not know that there are several hostages within the compound, neither does the sheriff.  Someone came running out of the Church’s building and the sheriff fired and killed the man running.  The man was unarmed and a hostage.  This started a war between the members of the Church and the police. 

Soon the lead ATF Agent called to headquarters and since shooting began the mission was reclassified to terrorist level.  This meant that the agents had every right to kill every member in the house; even the children.  The young woman who was watching the children met with the other hostage and they, after fighting, decided to plead their case to the agents.  They started talking to the lead Agent, but another agent came up and just shot them both, without care for what they were saying.

At the end, the man who started this whole event, the lead pastor, was not killed.  He and the surviving members heard trumpets, which signifies the rapture, and came out of their hiding place.  The ATF Agents arrested them.

At a debriefing, the lead agent finds out that it was the US Patriot Act that allowed the agents to kill everyone on the spot.  His superiors just wanted to kill the extremists, but they were also satisfied with being able to arrest the members and deny them of due process.  This action shows the real power of the US Patriot Act, which allows for the abuse of power.

Overall, both sides abused the power that they had. The pastor and members of the Westboro Baptist Church took the word of God and adapted it to fit their extremist views.  They killed people for a twisted reason.  The government, who was supposed to protect the children and the hostages, just killed them right on the spot, even as the hostage tried to explain who he was.  The US Patriot Act allowed the government to raise the encounter to the level of terrorist and many people were killed.  Even at arrest, the US Patriot Act allows the government to hold the pastor without trial.  He will never see the light of day.