14) HAROLD & KUMAR SUBVERT THE GENRE

(The following article is from the July 1-31, 2008, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, movie review by Asad Ali

The "road trip" genre is about heterosexual Anglo men going on a carefree odyssey, filled with cheap‑shot jokes that perpetuate prejudice and white male supremacy, ending with the heroes better prepared for their subservient role in capitalism.

     Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, released in 2004, subverted this theme with two men, one Korean and one South Asian, as the heroes. The jokes were still toilet‑humour, but with a twist, because at least some of them ridiculed racism, white supremacy, male chauvinism, and petty‑bourgeois illusions. The ending was a feel‑good moment for a much wider audience to relieve their anxieties, and for a change, the privileged (if not the powerful) were at the mercy of the film's messages to power.

     Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay is the subversion of the road trip genre coming out of its cocoon. The movie isn't restricted to road‑trip tropes, exploring Camp X‑Ray in Guantanamo Bay, interrogations at the Homeland Security Department, and George Bush's private lair. The jokes change direction pretty rapidly and aren't ideologically consistent, where this movie falls short of its betters such as Dr. Strangelove or A Fish Called Wanda. But in the end the movie has successfully ridiculed the complex ideas of homophobia, sexism, the many forms of racism, ruling class hypocrisy, the unreliability of the bourgeoisie as allies, drug war paranoia, non‑sequitor right-wing demagoguery, the prison concentration camp system, and even attempts to explain anti-imperialist resistance.

     Some left‑wing critics think the latest Harold & Kumar is insufficiently serious and makes light of dark issues like Guantanamo Bay. They forget that this series is subverting a traditionally white male supremacist genre, to attack the ideas this genre perpetuates. The humour formula makes this the wrong place to explore the semi‑secret concentration camps around the world run by the US government, or the resistance of the inmates and targeted peoples of the wars on terror and drugs.

     At the same time, the humour formula exacts a price. There are definitely moments where you will freeze uncomfortably as the movie turns to blatant sexism, anti‑Semitism, and other chauvinisms for shock value, just when it was establishing its progressive credentials. I hope the next episode in the series has more completely changed this genre.

     The movie does hit at some truths. As someone who has been forcibly interrogated thrice by the U.S. Homeland Security Department, I can share with you that the combination of illiteracy and white supremacist impulses of the interrogators can be just as perplexing and worrying in real life as on the screen. A catharsis like this is over‑due.

     A co‑worker of mine whose experience was even worse (he was physically tortured in the United States) read a draft of this review and then went to see the movie. He agreed that his interrogation experiences were similar to those of Harold and Kumar, and this was his first real chance to laugh at it. Both he and I hadn't laughed like that in a long time.

     The movie briefly explores one important idea which stands above all jokes - the necessity of working class whites to initiate opposition to racism to build the trust that can overthrow the irrational capitalist system. Pay attention near the end when one of the privileged characters rebels to help Harold and Kumar.

     There are still elements from White Castle, where the primary plot device is marijuana, and yes, there is still Doogie Howser ex machina. If you're looking for a good laugh, don't mind exposed genitals or the remnants of genre‑related shock sexism and racism the film is trying to shake off, and if you can get past the grave topic the movie deals with, go and see Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. And keep watching past the credits for a surprise at the end.