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Marvelous Movie Mondays: True Lies

EPFC | October 12th, 2017

MARVELOUS “WHO’S THE MONSTER” MOVIE MONDAYS!!!
guest curator: Amy Khoshbin

As we see the US suspending visas to Turkey now, I want to continue on with the theme of scenes in popular US films that portray the Middle Easterner or Muslim as the enemy…

This week, let’s watch the final fight scene in James Cameron’s True Lies (complete with “You’re fired” a la Trump). The premise is that Arnold Schwarzenegger is married to Jamie Lee Curtis and she thinks he’s a boring computer salesman, but he’s actually a US spy fighting terrorists worldwide. Specifically, he’s fighting fake Palestinian terrorist group Crimson Jihad, led by Salim Abu Aziz. This plot carries through the film as a backdrop to Arnold and Jamie’s marital mishaps and eventual reconciliation (it’s hot to kill “bad” people).

True Lies was made in 1994- in 1993 the Oslo Accord was signed, the “two-state” solution: the Palestine Liberation Organization recognized the state of Israel; Israel recognized the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people; and both sides agreed to resolve their outstanding differences by peaceful means. Then Feb 25, 1994, American-Israeli Baruch Goldstein, member of the far-right Israeli Kach movement, opened fire on a large number of Palestinian Muslims who had gathered to pray inside the Ibrahimi Mosque compound in Hebron, West Bank during Ramadan. 29 died and 125 wounded…

True Lies came out, with a Palestinian terrorist as lead enemy character that summer of ’94….interesting timing.