Fire In Babylon is the breathtaking story of how the West Indies triumphed over its colonial masters through the achievements of one of the most gifted teams in sporting history. As an avid supporter of West Indies cricket, this brand is very very excited. Expect this to be one of the most significant sports films this year. Beautiful.
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“In Forrest Gump, the activity of subcultures is typified through the life history of the other major character in the film: the love of Forrest’s life, Jenny. Through the opposition of Jenny and Forrest, it becomes clear that Forrest represents not all of American experience, but merely the experience of mainstream culture; Jenny represents an alternative path through recent U.S. history-the dark side of Forrest’s generally blissful (or at least, blissed out) experience. The film is unambiguous in its portrayal of American counterculture. If Jenny is unable to follow Forrest’s path through the major institutions of American life-college, the military, small business, sports, and so on-it is because she has been sexually abused by her father. Her immersion in the counterculture is treated less as a conscious choice than the consequences of a psychic trauma that she never gets to adequately address.
Counterculture and subcultures, the film seems to tell us, are for damaged souls. Jenny drifts through the American underworld: she appears in Playboy; while Forrest is in the mud of Vietnam, she gets involved with hippies and peaceniks (who drive a VW van painted with rainbow colours); she becomes involved with the SDS (Students’ Democratic Society) in Berkeley, which is led by her physically abusive boyfriend; she becomes suicidal after doing lines of coke as part of the early-1980s “me” generation; and, when she finally shows up again in Forrest’s life to introduce him to their son, she tells him: “I have some kind of virus and the doctors don’t know what it is and there isn’t anything they can do about it.” If Jenny’s trauma leads her into the U.S. counterculture, it is her involvement with the latter that leads to her death.
It is not difficult to see that the film suggests that subcultures and countercultures are dangerous, destructive, and misguided, especially for those involved in them. In the world narrated by Forrest Gump, happiness and fulfillment are achieved only by following the path of the straight and narrow (which in Forrest’s case has the added advantage of putting him into contact with important people, like Presidents Kennedy and Nixon). Forrest’s own happiness is impeded only by the fact of Jenny’s death, which is the direct consequence of her alternative lifestyle. Forrest’s son who represents the future of American society, is in some respects the product of both the mainstream and the counterculture, of Forrest and Jenny.
But what the film actually seems to argue is that America has a future despite the presence of the subculture. It’s up to Forrest, after all, to raise Forrest Jr. It is not accidental that Forrest Jr. is raised in the same place as his father; for all the things that have happened, the real America perseveres, unchanged by the challenges that the counterculture and history seemed to have posted to it. Near the end of the film Jenny suggests: “ I was messed up for a long time.” Forrest Gump exemplifies very clearly one of the dominant ways in which subcultures are represented—simply as the actions of misguided, messed-up people.
And yet, there are elements of the film that make us question its representation of American counterculture. Most obviously, it is the character of Forrest himself who causes us to wonder about the narrative we are being sold. Jenny is far more intelligent and self-conscious than Forrest; if Forrest represents the mainstream, then the mainstream is shown to be unthinking—emotional and intuitive rather than reasoned and reflective. Forrest suggests that “for some reason I fit in the army like a round peg.” His successes come out of his ability to slide into pre-existing systems and institutions; he challenges nothing and accepts everything.
In Forrest Gump, the options in post-Second World War American society come down to two equally problematic positions: either one joins the counterculture and challenges norms and limits, but at the price of one’s own happiness, health, and life; or one unthinkingly accepts “what is” even if this means participating in an imperialist war or raping the environment (as recorded by Forrest’s enormous haul of shrimp in the Gulf of Mexico). This is a false choice, of course; we need not acquiesce to the either/or that the film constructs for us. Nor need we accept its stereotypes of the counterculture, even if we should note that it is precisely such representations of sub- and countercultures that inform the way in which we view their activities, as well as the people that participate in them.”
many moons ago when i was in the navy we pulled in to pakistan, so like usual we hit the beach in search of women and beer, well not knowing much about the customs we shed our shirts and about four of my buddies and i are traveling down a very busy street, its like 100 degrees out side and everyones staring at us. we stand out like a sore thumb. finally a guy says in very broken english for us to put back on our shirts. it’s like tabboo or a total insult to the people there. so not finding much of a party vibe here we all got into a cab and told the driver to take us some place else. we get out of town a little way and the driver turns around and says hashish? hashish? you could of heard a pin drop. then of course i said how much? oh very very cheap for you my friend. so we say yeah were in. we keep driving and driving and by now we are out in the middle of nowhere and starting to get a little nervous. finally he pulls up to an old three story building and stops the cab. he say how much you want, i said give me twenty bucks worth, my buddies are like i’ll take 40 worth one guy goes shit give me 50 worth. so we are waiting and waiting and just wondering if we’re gonna get shot at any moment when the guy comes back with this huge bag! i was expecting maybe a couple of grams this guys hands me a piece hash the size of a bikers wallet for 20 bux. we are freaking! the size of this stuff is huge. we somehow still have to get back on board the ship. so the driver whips out a little pipe and a piece of hash the size of a dime, he lights it up and passes it around .that little piece got me and my buddies trashed, then we start getting paranoid what if this guys N.I.S. or what if he’s got an ak-47 or oh shit what if we get caught, we start having visions of pakistani prisons. so anyway to make a long story short we calmed down stuck the hash down our pants and went back to the ship and no problems. somehow word spread (it always does) guys are buying shoe box size boxes of hash in hopes of returning back to the states and buying new harleys (no customs) well, so many guys are getting burnt on piss tests. somebody gets the idea to sneak into the officers mess and put a bunch of hash in the coffee now everybody’s coming up hot. well word gets out they put a narc on board our ship disguised as one of the boiler techs. this guy ends up getting people on tape and everything and like 9 of my friends went to leavenworth brigg for awhile. buy the time i got back home i had about a piece of hash the size of a silver dollar and a quarter inch thick .i was SO burnt out on that stuff. i was setting around telling this story to my civillian friends at a party and that hash trashed everybody there, man was i lucky not to get busted, ah to be young and stupid. -hd07
I’m not sure how I ended up on the radio but it was great because I walked in completely unprepared and it shows. FFFFANBOY reppin.
Joey Nobleman Radio Show – FFFFANBOY’s Mudasser by DJ DNTFCKRND
