America as Home
By Amy Bangerter

aaaa have lived in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, for almost two years now, during which time I have viewed five-and-a-half films on the big screen. My lack of theater attendance can probably be attributed to a combination of the movie selections themselves and the incessant cell phone talking and text messaging that goes on in theaters here, despite a person's liberal distribution of the half-turn head jerk. However, I recklessly decided to brave the spectacle that was "Spiderman 3 opening weekend" in pursuit of Gabriel Range's film, Death of a President. It was a rewarding evening: the film ultimately proved very useful in helping me negotiate the disconnect I have been feeling with the traditional rhetoric of nation as homeland. aaaaAlthough the government of the United Arab Emirates is on friendly terms with my own (at least for the time being), due to regional tensions and international skepticism toward recent U.S. policies in the Middle East, I have to admit that my association of Home with the country called America has become less seamless of late. I find myself, more and more, tempted to pass as Canadian when queried by people I don't know. I find myself not only shunning American foodstuffs in the local supermarket, but then imbuing the hapless products like Jell-o No Bake Cheesecakes, Cheese Whiz, and Apple Jacks with cultural and political nuances their makers could scarcely believe possible. I find myself mortified that my two-year-old, who has lived most of his life in Dubai, thinks that the letter M -- and its upside down counterpart, letter W -- stand for French fries. And I feel revulsion at the widespread consumption of the new Fulla doll, a Middle Eastern version of Barbie. Even though Fulla may not share Barbie's values, she certainly shares her dress size, and I mourn for the generation of young Arabic girls who will also spend the rest of their lives trying unsuccessfully to imitate an unrealistic model of the female body.
aaaaWhile I haven't by any means gone native (it's hard to do in a country where there are fewer natives than ex-pats), my feelings toward my homeland have changed since I first arrived, when nationality played a much bigger role in the construction of my identity. Enter my most recent trip to the cinema. Range's film both highlighted and somewhat alleviated my feelings of ambivalence and guilt: ambivalence over my feelings about claiming American citizenship, and guilt over feeling such ambivalence.	a
aaaaThe film is another one of Range's collages of real-time footage and fictional events. The result is a surreal experience in which you leave the theater trying to sort out what was real and what was imagined. The controversy surrounding the film--which pivots around the fictional assassination of current U.S. President George W. Bush--only highlights the success of Range's stylized filmmaking. Although the movie ultimately points out some of the ideas gone awry in the culture created by the Bush administration, I marveled at Range's presentation of the President as a human being and the way the film castigated the mob mentality and the taking of human life. This subject resonated with me as I contrasted such lawlessness with my Sri Lankan friend's stories of bomb blasts and burning houses for something as criminal as a cricket team's early retirement from the World Cup. It reminded me of the more than two centuries of peaceful transfers of power we have experienced in America, and of the miracle of the unwritten code upon which the opposition agrees: peaceful protest and vocal disagreement. aaaaThe different profiles of possible shooters highlighted in the film reminded me of America's growing diversity and, consequently, the greater burden of stewardship its citizens share in making the right judgments about individuals--those within our own contact or those within the larger framework of our communities. While I was, of course, disappointed at the movie's furthering the stereotype of the disgruntled and mentally unstable African-American war veteran taking matters into his own hands, I thought the film treated the dilemma of Post-9/11 Arabs living in the U.S. in a compassionate and intelligent manner. aaaaThe film's main message--the propagandizing and victimization of individuals to support theories in which institutions have already vested a great deal of time and energy--is a grand criticism of the system itself and the people who buy into it. While such a theme spoke to my negative feelings toward my homeland, the vehicle through which such a criticism was presented, the freedom of speech, provided yet another example of my conundrum of being an American. Even in a country like the U.A.E., such freedom has its limit: just ask the ex-pat professors who were fired in 2006 for leading provocative discussions in Emirati-run colleges about the controversial Danish cartoons of the prophet Mohammed. Such freedom, however, when held sacred, is ultimately the freedom for improvement. aaaaRange's film, which beautifully and thoughtfully travels the line between trying to understand our leaders while questioning their decisions, holds such power. It is reminiscent of Langston Hughes' defense that he criticized his country in his writings only because he loved it. And why not: it was his home. I, too, despite my current ambivalence, can say that I love my American home and will try to help close the gap between its ideals and its practices, even if it means making a few messy home repairs along the way.