If the Orlando Bloom character had been a fictionalized Bush to the extent Citizen Kane was for William Randloph Hearst, then he might not have had so many inherent positive qualities. Instead our Middle Ages “W” would have been tottering at the heels of his father, an opium addict, possibly a womanizer (and consequently a leper himself?), certainly not a warrior (he would send other men to war while avoiding any direct contact with it himself).

The film’s hero rather seems to rise to greatness despite his previous lot in life: poor, provincial, a “bastard” child, etc. While the notion of rags to riches by means of hard work and honesty and bravery is really nice, appealing especially in a very “American Dream” sort of way, here it’s taken to a ludicrous degree when you sum it up and think about it: he finally meets his father, a noble Lord, who acknowledges him and embraces him warmly; he magically learns English, I guess, despite living in south France; he learns how to be a great sword fighter in just one quick forest sequence; he is bequethed his father’s entire estate with one slap in the face; he rides into his new town, meets the Princess of Jerusalem, and she literally throws herself at him, despite her being married (of course he verbally refuses her [we don't want to piss off the Baptist audiences] before going on with the heated affair); he builds a well with his bare hands in an otherwise waterless strip of arid land; he becomes a war leader, war genius, and war hero, though, as far as we know, he’s never seen a war; and, this is my favorite, the King himself offers to have his own brother-in-law killed so that he can marry his beautiful sister and become King of Jerusalem. This guy refues the last offer, but goes on to fight with other soldiers, surrender their stronghold, and thus save lots of lives. That sounds to me nothing at all like our current president and his administration. It is nothing more that man-fantasy.

Who and what was interesting in this movie? Pretty much nothing and nobody on the Western side, for they were just about all grizzled and hard-boiled from the endless years of wars. In fact, it was the leader of the other side, whose name I forget, who was by far the most interesting character. He was in a much tighter spot, provoked repeatedly by the war-mongering gringos, and pressured into capturing Jerusalem. Wise. Educated. Genius. Compassionate too? Why weren’t we following him? Why wasn’t he the central character? That’s easy to answer.

Starting with “the film’s hero…” I agree with you 100 percent. Especially the part about the Muslim character…the actor’s skills were much more impressive and his character much more interesting.

However, one thing you failed to mention was the actual historical accuracy of the film. I’m pretty sure that the Muslims and the “war-mongering gringos” didn’t part friends and give each other horses after the city was surrendered.

Anyway, I don’t think one needs to look for political parallels. Not only do they not apply, they are irrelevant (to me anyway) to the quality of the movie. People are talking about the political parallels of Revenge of the Sith…and I say…who cares. There are plenty of things to enjoy and make fun of both without noting that George might have inserted some anti-bushisms in with the other horrendous dialogue.

Or something like that…does that help?

We need a little idealism, don’t you think?…the Democrats have enough pessimism for both parties, so someone has to be able to see past their own eyeballs. I think a little bit of realism could have helped. You know, “It’s going to be a lot of hard work,” etc, etc. But it’s not like we haven’t heard that before.

Someone has to project a view of how much better the world can be, and this time it has to be the Republicans.