Steven Spielberg’s Hollywood savvy is second to none but even he couldn’t have seen this one coming.
Spielberg’s live-action, $140 million take on Roald Dahl’s beloved children’s story The BFG- Spielberg’s first venture into cinematic fairytale territory- was blown away at the July 4th box office by The Purge: Election Year, a weakly-reviewed horror sequel with a $10 million budget.
How on earth did The Purge franchise get to be so popular? Perhaps because the film’s mixture of violent mayhem and political hysteria, while set in 2021, turns out to be ideally suited to the current cultural climate.
“During this peculiar election year The Purge is perhaps the ultimate winner in political philosophy.”
In the series, created by director James DeMonaco, a future America allows for crime — particularly murder, mayhem and torture — to be legal for one night of the year. During the 12-hour-long Purge Night, people can chose either to hunker down and try to stay safe, or rage freely.
For the other 364 days, society’s more overt criminal activity seems to have been magically restrained if not pushed out of sight. Purge Day apparently offers a day when anyone can commit violent mayhem without consequence.
Is this series an exercise straight out the playbooks of existentialist Albert Camus or the Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky? Is it a statement about the conflict between freedom, violence and social status? Or is it simply an exploitation flick, where a cheesy premise embraced by a simplistic philosophy, gives the story a framework for ultra-violence scenes to be graphically displayed?
From the Japanese feature Battle Royale to a mega blockbuster like The Hunger Games, the idea of government sanctioned fights to the death has always resonated.
That is the raison d’être of The Purge trilogy but the franchise ratchets up that concept way beyond a small scale challenge to a force which drives the nation run by the neo-fascist New Founders of America.
Noted actor Ethan Hawke and Game of Thrones actress Lena Headey starred in the first installment which focused on his family defending itself from attacking Purgers. Despite mixed reviews, the film took in $34 million on its opening weekend — the biggest opening of Hawke’s career.
The Purge 3:
People can say or do whatever they want every day.
But only on the Internet.
It’s exactly like it is now.
It’s terrifying.
— Sequels We Want (@SequelsWeWant) July 6, 2016
Expanding this premise, the just-released The Purge: Election Year moves from the second installment The Purge: Anarchy, where it becomes clear that some of the Purgers — if not most of them — are rich social elites, the haves, who rage on the sort of have nots, i.e., the rest of us.
In the latest Purge movie, taking place two years after survivor Leo Barnes (Frank Grillo) refused to commit an act of revenge on Purge Night, he is now head of security for tough but idealistic Senator Charlie Roan (Elizabeth Mitchell). He strives to protect her while she runs for President campaigning to end The Purge, which puts her at odds with the nearly monolithic powers running America.
Days before the election, they must survive the annual ritual which targets the poor and innocent for annihilation. When a betrayal forces them out on Washington D.C. the streets during Purge Night — when no help is on hand — they must stay alive until dawn or be sacrificed in their fight against the state.
Rather than The Purge be mere catharsis for all of society to release its darkest tendencies, it seem to have a hidden and hideous agenda of weeding out the unwanted. As a result of knowing that, a presidential candidate emerges who wants to end The Purge and resist the powers that be.
However you interpret who these elites are, the concept is addictive to audiences drawn to seeing an exercise in what social license should allow or shouldn’t allow taken to its extremes.
Though I may be saying the obvious, the parallel of a woman running for President who wants to eliminate an event where guns and knives can used freely without consequences with what’s happening is now also striking a chord with audiences.
During this peculiar election year — where both candidates find ways to see who can lower their popularity with voters — The Purge is perhaps the ultimate winner in political philosophy.