Kevin Spacey, David Gale, and Legitimate Post-Modern Christianity

By S. Jovian Radheshwar

Before considering the film, The Life of David Gale, directed by Alan Parker, I would like to encourage anybody who has seen this movie to go read the reviews written by mainstream commentators on film, and to brace themselves for the simple-mindedness they will be exposed to in the process. It seems as though Mr. Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, and others that are not even worth mentioning here are engaged in a self-deception too deeply rooted in their notions of propriety to permit them to have an open-minded, unprejudiced read of the film. Indeed, this film was labeled as “sanctimonious”, “pretentious”, and even as “offensive” by the major mainstream film criticism trade. These simplistic condemnations are indicative of an inability of these reviewers to grasp the main premise behind the film. It is something that is an alien concept to them. Rebellion. The machine continues to operate, to execute, whatever is fed it by the currents of the state and its “objective” judicial system. It implies a particular imperial logic only found in organizations of great power, complete with self-referential systems of morality, where legitimacy comes not from truly objective facts and proofs, but rather from the continuing adherence to inner-standards of the organizational machine.

In this film, lead actor Kevin Spacey delivers a brilliant performance. He plays the role of David Gale, a philosophy professor at the fictitious University of Austin (no doubt based on the University of Texas), in Texas, who also is extremely active in the local branch of the anti-death penalty movement. As the type of individual whose ego and satisfaction are premised primarily upon the utilization of his own intellect to solve major problems, the underbelly of his ego remains exposed to the manipulations of attractive women. When a graduate student, recently expelled from the school, seduces David at a rowdy party, his life takes a turn for the worse. The student sought revenge and fingered Mr. Gale with an accusation of rape, he spends time in jail, and his wife divorces him and leaves with their son for Spain, where she has apparently been less than faithful to David herself. To add further injury to the insult, Mr. Gale is dismissed from the University and from Deathwatch, the local pressure group, due to his status as a rapist (despite the disappearance of his accuser) Mr. Gale is “politically incorrect”. This points at his status on the outside of the replicative inner logic of the power system, and his unconformed behavior has gotten him into quite a bit of trouble. He is an outcaste.

In this setting, the film’s real narrative begins, with Mr. Gale in prison for the murder of a colleague at Deathwatch, and his subsequent summoning of reporter Bitsy Bloom, played by Kate Winslett, to his prison cell just three days prior to his scheduled execution at the hands of the state. What follows cannot be specifically revealed in this analysis, as it would give away the plot. However, I can say that major themes, of rebellion, self-sacrifice for the greater good of the collective psyche of mankind and even an obvious and ever-present allusion to the Jesus-myth sculpt the remainder of the film. Just keep in mind that the Jesus-myth is premised on Jesus’ stand against Roman tyranny, post-modern America’s historical analogue, and on Jesus’ forehand knowledge due to his divine position. In the information age, the Roman empire’s ghastly death camp is the Republic of Texas, and the control of information makes you a god. Through the manipulation of these two notions, Alan Parker and screenwriter Nicholas Cage weave a post-modern biblical tale, utterly respectful of what Christianity is all about, respectful of the human capacity for self-sacrifice and the capacity to do good in the face of the more convenient option of accepting injustice and allowing normalization to set in. Mr. Gale’s murdered colleague is murdered in a manner so brutal, the former professor’s fate is all but sealed in the eyes of the state, and his conviction has been confirmed by all the courts in Texas and even the Federal courts. To say he was set up is an understatement, as the viewer will quickly learn.

Don’t let Mr. Ebert and his neophyte-clique of simpletons fool you, the film’s medium of Mr. Gale peppering Ms. Bloom with clues of his innocence are not a mis-en-scene in of themselves. Pay close attention to Mr. Gale’s narrative, this section of the film was not constructed in haste, or to make us feel as though the film is a murder mystery, rather it serves the purpose of revealing the nature of information, disinformation and ultimately relates to the concept of “half-martyrdom”, and Mr. Gale’s distaste for philosophical inconsistency. In the heartland of America, where Christianity is most perverted in its transition from scripture to practice in post-modernity, Mr. Gale and his colleagues are much like Jesus and his disciples, rebelling against the tyranny of Empire, giving birth to post-modern Christianity where the modernist variant has been hopelessly co-opted by politicians, hate-mongers and greedy people practicing idolatry of the worst kind with the most dangerous implications for the legitimacy of our collective notions of good and evil. I strongly recommend this film; I wish I could make everyone in America watch it. Its timeliness and poignancy render it indispensable to the American experience after 9/11.