By Jason Apuzzo. Yesterday, after my post on the new film Tomorrow When the War Began (which appears to be a kind of Australian Red Dawn), a reader named Psudo reminded me that this new film is coming out at roughly the same time as the new videogame Homefront - which is actually written by Red Dawn writer/director John Milius, and is quite obviously inspired by the subject matter of his original film. Check out the two trailers for the game, above and below. My understanding is that Homefront will be coming out in February.
John Milius' forthcoming video game.
Homefront is actually set about 15 years from now. The idea is that North Korea has become a mini-expansionist empire, invigorated by a young new leader, and that this empire grows to consume both South Korea and Japan. Meanwhile, the United States’ economic and military profiles continue to weaken. The North Koreans then launch some kind of advanced electronic pulse weapon that takes out our defense systems. Enter North Korean invaders.
Whether one finds this scenario especially plausible, by the way, isn’t really the issue here. What’s fascinating is how prevalent this type of scenario is becoming in current projects.
We’ve been documenting these invasion scenarios here at Libertas all summer, as regular readers know. These scenarios are truly starting to appear everywhere – most prominently in science fiction films. Suffice to say that Homefront is looking not only a lot like the forthcoming MGM remake of Red Dawn, but also this new Australian film Tomorrow When the War Began, plus the forthcoming web series Red Storm, and about a hundred different sci-fi invasion stories coming down the pike. Plus, this summer we’ve seen the return of films depicting the Cold War Soviet spy threat in Salt and Farewell, and vivid depictions of communist tyranny in indie films like Mao’s Last Dancer, Disco & Atomic War, and The Red Chapel (which deals specifically with North Korea).
How big of a trend is this? It’s a very big one that’s impacting us in many different ways. Two recent films greenlit with $200 million budgets – Universal’s Battleship and the Warner Brothers Battle of Midway – both seem to partake in the trend, for example. [Midway was the World War II battle that permanently scuttled any Japanese hopes of invading America; Battleship is a World War II-style naval battle, set in the future, pitting a combined Earth navy against an invading alien force.]
We’ll keep an eye on all this here at Libertas, to be sure. I personally think these films reflect deep domestic anxieties about the direction the country’s going in … and I don’t think these anxieties are waning. They’re only growing in intensity.
One final word: I spent a pleasant evening several years ago with John Milius; we smoked cigars and talked about the White Rajah of Sarawak … and, ironically, about Mao. I want to wish him the best with this new project.
Posted on September 1st, 2010 at 4:37pm.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Mr. K, Libertas Film Mag. Libertas Film Mag said: RED DAWN’s John Milius Returns to Fight North Korean Invaders in HOMEFRONT … See: http://bit.ly/d1tA4J [...]
WOLVERINES!!!
Wolverines!
Not to be too cynical, but the way videogames are heading, especially with the apparent anti-Tea Party themes in Bioshock 2, Homefront always came off to me as a “what if what we did to Iraq happened to us.” Or in other words, a “we were evil occupiers of Iraq.” Could be wrong, but from Bioshock, Bioshock 2, Fallout 3, and various other games, the media has not been kind so far to conservative ideas.
Milius wrote this, so it’s extremely difficult to imagine that happening on this one. John is very right wing. And the trailers certainly give no indication of the type of themes you’re describing. I get your point about the other games, though.
As Freud once said, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
shinsnake, what are the anti-Tea Party themes in Bioshock 2? I just finnished the game last week and didn’t notice anything. Have you seen the new Bioshock is going to be in the sky?
Milius definitely has the bona fides for a project like this. He’s a hugely influential and LITERATE writer whose time has come again. It’s a welcome wind of Truth that hopefully begins a counter Narrative to the constant drumbeat of anti-Christian, anti-American, anti-family rhetoric of mainstream Hollywood and Media. It begins with movies and games like this that act as an alarm bell to the consequences of the actions and/or inaction of our so-called leaders. I hope and pray this continues and grows.
You would absolutely love John in person. He’s like a big, friendly Buddha with a beard and a cigar – and as you say, exceptionally literate and funny. He’s fought a lot of wars in the Hollywood system and I think they’ve taken their toll on him. I’m really glad to see him re-emerging with something as no-holds-barred as this.
Besides being a pretty solid craftsman, the one thing you can always depend on Milius for is context. He’ll always execute his story from a base of intellectual honesty.
Red Dawn is more than an ’80s action film because the scenario is logical, insightful, and bold. And for all of its weirdness, Apocalypse Now does a pretty good job of showing how nasty United States’ enemy was in Vietnam — it’s what gives the picture its weight and timelessness.
It was only a matter of time for Milius to resurface.
I’m really interested to see how this game turns out.
You can always count on Milius to deliver as long as long as he is not in charge (which from what I understand is the case here; he’s just writing the script, other people are developing the game). His worst projects are the ones he has directed himself; Conan is a good film but I don’t think John was aiming to make an unintentionally hilarious cheese fest; Red Dawn suffers from a unfocused script and lots of badly put together action scenes, The Wind and the Lion while not bad is almost totally unmemorable.
Saw some interesting production stills from the new Conan today. Maybe I’ll put those up next week.