Imagine a utopia where all are happy, unemployment is basically nonexistent, and there is peace on every street corner.
The only think you need to give up for 364 1/2 days of wonder and goodness is one day of violence--the PURGE is born. In this new movie released June 7, the government endorses the PURGE of citizens.. it allows any type of violence you can imagine. Murder, plundering, pillaging, raping.. anything goes. For one day.
Ethan Hawke is the star of the flick. In it, he seems convinced, as do all other Americans, that the twisted PURGE sanctioned by the government is not only acceptable but also necessary to maintain order. The nationwide 12-hour crime spree has deadly implications for people in the PURGE, accept for the main character's family. He built a fortified bunker, one that you can't enter, or exit. But being a film with a plot, there is a mistake made by someone in the family, and a streak of morality forces the character's son to try to help a man being 'purged.' Then the choice of the film becomes: Defend the man and risk their lives for 12 hours, or throw him back onto the streets to let him die.. ?
There are very big moral implications in the PURGE. There are tough questions..
Yes it's meant to be a summer sci-fi-horror flick, but the entertainment value seems to vanish as you enter into the world of a purge..
There is one fanboy controversy stemming from THE PURGE. There was apparently a STAR TREK plot exceptionally similar to the PURGE's storyline.. But why would we think any idea is genuine? Even Shakespeare copied, right? ...
The other story of THE PURGE are the voices we hear calling for it to be banned!.. we are seeing some online say that the PURGE should be purged. The argument of Jim Kirwan, as posted on RENSE.COM, is that the PURGE film is going to have some real psychological effects on the nation.. real ones. He writes that the movie is a psy-op that is meant to destroy the fabric of the nation...
Expect to hear other voices online saying this.
The movie is controversial.. It has a controversial word of mouth--and that may do nothing but help the movie itself gain more attention and become a bigger attraction at the box office..
But real reviews, not the conspiratorial ones, are being written about the film.
At its best, the film has moments that recall higher-toned dystopian fiction, particularly the cycle of suburban noir reworked over and over again by Ballard in novels like “Running Wild,” “Cocaine Nights” and “Super-Cannes,” as well as trashier movie pleasures like “The Stepford Wives.” Auxiliary prospects could be improved by cult status
The tension is well sustained and the film is an effective, predictable cross between Assault on Precinct 13 (the remake of which DeMonaco scripted) and Funny Games (the fair-haired preppy leader of the sinister besiegers is a dead ringer for one of the psychopathic kids in Michael Haneke's film). But it's an excuse for a great deal of blood-letting rather than an occasion for ethical or political reflection.The conclusion suggests that in most circumstances most people will act with extreme moral turpitude.
The best American film of the week, The Purge, is an interesting collision of genres. Writer-director James DeMonaco has created a family-in-peril thriller, reminiscent of Panic Room.t’s dystopic science fiction, like The Running Man or The Hunger Games. And it strays into the area of horror, like Straw Dogs and Funny Games.It’s clever in the way it takes some disagreeable elements from our own time — fear of racial minorities, envy of wealth, needless aggression and gun crime — slightly exaggerates them and projects them into the near future.
There are two stories in the PURGE. One is the science fiction and horror element that will undoubtedly be eaten up and enjoyed by fans of the genres. The other story, the one perhaps we should pause and consider a little more deeply, is the moral and societal implications of a legalized purge.. and wonder a bit about whether we are already on a dangerous road that this storyline will somehow become a matter of fact in the future...