Walker (1987)

Walker (1987)

Before Rambo... Before Oliver North...

Directed by Alex Cox

Featuring: Ed Harris, Richard Masur, Peter Boyle, Marlee Matlin

Rating: 3 1/2 stars.

On the surface, Alex Cox's Walker is nothing more than a modern adaptation of American filibuster William Walker's incursion into Nicaragua in mid 19th century.

Walker bombed at the box office because people were expecting a biopic, something like Sid and Nancy, Cox's previous film. The film is not a biopic, as a matter of fact, it was was never meant to be taken seriously. Not even the characters in the film take themselves seriously. How do you judge the acting if it is intentionally bad? Yes, Ed Harris' acting is laughable and over the top but there is a reason for it. The film would not have worked without it.

The beauty of the film lies in that Cox intends to expose history as narrative and uses anachronisms (such as Coca-Cola bottles in the 1850s) and auto-referentiality (for example Walker is pictured on the cover of Newsweek Magazine) in order to remind us that what we are watching is fiction, but at the same time, this fiction is the unbelievable reality of the Nicaraguan people.

The film is a great example of Post-Modernism in film. At the end of Walker, we see a helicopter fly into the Nicaraguan city of Granada. This anachronism breaches the barriers of past and present, and invites us to reevaluate the presence of the United States in Latin America. In order to send Walker's message effectively, Cox required both the use of Magical Realism (or the fantastical elements) and Post-Modern hyperreality. As a whole, their unity is what modern art is all about: the pursuit of the hybrid as a source of beauty, and the understanding that this condition of hybridism in film is nothing more than a reflection of reality.

The only drawback is that this movie is trying to be too many things at once: a two hour long critique of the Iran-Contra affair, a historical drama, a comedy, a satire, the list goes on. At times, the movie does get very messy and seems to drag on, pick up suddenly, and move forward without any real direction. At least the score (done by the ever so great Joe Strummer) successfully establishes unity throughout the film.

Bottomline, Walker's strength lies in the message that it is trying to send. This movie is a must see for anyone interested in Postmodernism, Magical Realism, Latin American history and Cultural studies.

-Simulacrum