Bobby

one among walter benjamin's many great observations about art in the mechanical age of reproduction is that we no longer have to concern ourselves with originality. he wrote, in his characteristically disjointed but incisive manner:

"the social significance of film, even -- and especially -- in its most positive form, is inconceivable without its destructive, cathartic side: the liquidation of the value of tradition in the cultural heritage."

this is startling. but, when we think about it, we can see that this insight is critical to a nuanced understanding film. movies, because they are reproductions of some prior unoriginal act, do not represent reality as it was at that time, but a representation of a representation. that's it.

what's more, this notion that film destroys and liquidates "the value of tradition" is an inherently progressive idea. that is to say, because film is a representation of a representation it cannot have at its antecedent some grand cultural heritage available to only a select few (the aristocracy, as benjamin would have it).

benjamin was right to say that film would be a democratic medium -- after all, anyone can make one. with this much welcomed untethering of art from aristocracy also comes, however, a slightly nasty underside: if anyone can make a movie, anyone will, and so movies like britney spears' "crossroads" has to exist alongside a brilliant film like "das experiment."

i say all this, it so happens, to be able to make this claim about emilio estevez's new movie "bobby": it was feel-good, smarmy, and sentimental. it was also a brilliant if slightly fanciful account of the night of RFK's death that, to my mind, perfectly encapsulated not RFK's life but the aura surrounding the idea of bobby.

i think "bobby" is a great movie not because it pretends to represent a true and factual accounting of RFK's death (er, savage murder) but rather a representation of what RFK the man -- called by many who loved him "bobby" -- meant to americans. "bobby" is successful because it liquidates historical accuracy for the kind of sentimentalism only silly movies can offer.

to put it another way: if you liked RFK and believe, as i do, that the world would be a drastically better place if he had won the presidency in 1968 (and again in 1972), you'll love this movie. if you don't like RFK, you'll hate it.