Betrayed by Constanin Costa-Gavras :: Movie, Film

The opening lyrics to America the Beautiful, O beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, demonstrate how land and stalk farming have been ingrained, to al intimately mythical proportions, as quintessentially American amongst citizens in the United States. As the Great Plains of the Midwest helped establish the U.S. as a major economic superpower throughout the twentieth century, the nation grew by distributing vast amounts of grain across the globe, providing those farming in the region both a secure and profitable existence. But with the proliferation of farming technologies enabling foreign nations to establish a foothold in a unsanded global economy, the U.S. and its farmers faced increase competition, and their stranglehold on grain exportation waned. You just cant make a living growing wheat anymore, says Greg Grenz, a farmer in Eureka South Dakota, as many U.S. farmers are increasingly under pressure as Americas run as a wheat powerhouse, and the dominant playe r in global agriculture, is under attack from a crop of newly emboldened, low-cost international rivals who are striking at nonpareil of the main pillars of American economic might food exports (Roger Thurow, 2004). Security and prosperity it seems are dwindling in the nations fertile plains. In most cases, with little recourse available, todays farmers are faced with a frightening decision change their farming practices, via planting new crops or utilizing new techniques, or quit farming outright, forfeiting lands that may have been in families for generations and, more importantly, losing an identity that many consider to be most American.Constanin Costa-Gavras, in his film Betrayed (1988), uses this good example of economic hardships caused by a declining farming industry to present his audience with some farmers who have decided on another option, lashing out violently at people who they believe are responsible for their plight. The film about star-crossed love and death and d anger in white-picket-fence America (Kemply, 1988), involves a fictional conjunction that employs white supremacist ideology to spread hate and intolerance as they blame Jews, non-whites, and the government for the economic conditions which they endure. The film also demonstrates the early use of the computer to sort out and connect these hate mongers, forecasting the use and proliferation of the internet to recruit new white supremacists around the country. As Randy Blazack, sociologist from Portland State University, elaborates in American Skinheads (2007), whether youre recruiting people to be suicide bombers or recruiting foot soldiers in the racial holy war, youre going after the same pay off of people, youre going after people who feel like theyre at the end of their rope, and the only recourse left is one of violence (Geographic, 2007).