One of the Oscar favourites of this year, One Battle After Another, could well be THE defining reality of our world today. Just when we thought Russia-Ukraine was an anomaly, we had Israel-Palestine. Just when we thought, two wars in the 21st century is bizarre and surreal, we had Pakistan-Afghanistan. And even before we could process that, we have Israel-US-Iran in the biggest conflict the region has seen in a very long time. One Battle After Another, indeed!
The story revolves around the operations of French75, an anti-establishment revolutionary group, in the southern border states of the US, fighting the Government’s anti-immigrant crackdown, and other neo-imperialist-capitalist nexus across the country, led by Perfidia (Teyana Taylor) and Ghetto Pat (Leonardo). After many successful revolutionary years, one wrong impulsive act, leads to the downfall of the group, with each of the members either killed or gone into hiding, hunted down by their arch nemesis, the stereo-typical white supremacist, Colonel Lockjaw (Sean Penn). As 16 years pass, and Ghetto Pat becomes Bob Ferguson (in hiding), raising his and Perfidia’s daughter, Willa (Chase Infiniti), as a single dad, Colonel Lockjaw is back to hunt them down, to win the much coveted membership of the Christmas Adventures Club, the pinnacle group of White Supremacist Community, with a self-declared agenda of protecting and cleansing the country of all impurities. What unfolds is a cat and mouse tense chase, with humorous yet profound consequences for everyone involved.
One can tell why this is one of the Oscar favourites this year. It speaks perfectly to the Hollywood liberal, anti-Trump, anti-MAGA sentiment, that we’ve seen in the Academy, in the Grammy’s, and every other similar forums. And it represents the post-modern dystopian world view of America, that is increasingly the popular world view. In that sense, it’s a predictable set up. The hard right people in power are the bad guys. The left-wing fighters are the good guys. Nothing special there.
What’s special however, is the nuances that the director explores WITHIN each side. That’s where the impact of the film is really felt.
Let’s start with the left-leaning liberal revolutionaries of the French 75. Even as they start with conviction and passion that youth have, that also fuels an adrenaline-driven sexual energy between Perfidia and Pat, a growing older and changing life stage (after they have a baby), breaks down the very ideological glue that bonded them together. Is it more important to change the world, or to raise my own child? The two of them make very different choices, and pay their respective price for it.
Then there’s the sanctity of the ideology and what it takes to break it. As revolutionaries, how far are they willing to go, before they cave in. We are deeply distressed (an emotion that sustains throughout the film) when see how easily Perfidia, as the most passionate leader of the group, breaks and gives into the Colonel Lockjaw, the consequences of which are borne by everyone for the rest of the film. What happens to the true believers of the cause, when the leaders themselves betray them. Who are they fighting anymore? And why?
The commentary on the inner workings of a revolutionary organisation is done hilariously well, symbolised by Pat’s phone conversation with the new Gen Z members of the French 75, not being able to remember his secret code to get help in finding his abducted daughter, just because he’s older, not in practice, and drunk and drugged out of his mind. They may have a cause to fight for, but like any other organisation, they are dealing with the same challenges of protocol and Gen Z workforce! Brilliant!
And yet, the film shows hope for organisations and groups with a liberal ideology. Symbolised by Sergio (the brilliant Benicio Del Toro), the karate sensei for Willa, and leader of an underground immigrant community in the city, who provides blind and unflinching support to Pat for his mission, just because of the work and the legend he was 16 years ago, as part of the French 75.
Now, let’s take the hard right white supremacist side, symbolised by two very different factions. On one side, there’s the Christmas Adventures Club, a group that reminds us of many such groups we’ve heard of. A secret membership-by-appointment only, self-appointed protectors of purity and white culture in America. Just like their cause, there is no black or grey in their mission. You’re either pure or not. And any impurity needs to be gotten rid of.
But on the other side, there are aspiring members, like Colonel Lockjaw (Sean Penn hits it out of the park with this character), who would do anything, including killing his own daughter, to be in this club. Only that he is not as strong and racist as he would like to be. And in trying his entire life to live up to his own ideology, comes his greatest achievements and his biggest downfall. Not as straightforward to be hard right, either, when you are a human being too!
And that’s perhaps the underlying reality that connects the two fighting factions. The human frailty. The human emotions. The human fragility. The human flaws. Our own human-ness is a great leveller. How can our ideologies trump that? We all want to protect our children, we all want to survive, we all want to fuck, we all want to succeed, we all want to love, we all want to be loved. And that will stay on and continue for much longer, beyond any other pursuit, ideological or otherwise.
And that’s how the movie segways towards the ending. An ending that is in the present-continuous, as a work in progress, as a continuing story of life, that will never end. We will continue to struggle, to fight, to hope, to be anxious, to chase beliefs and dreams of building a better world, to balance between our ideals and our everyday mundane realities, to make choices in favour of one or the other and living with the consequences of those choices, till the next milestone of making the next choice comes along.
Moving from One Battle After Another.
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