For as much as I enjoy so-called “prestige horror” such as The Invitation (2015), Get Out (2017) and Hereditary (2018), there is something to be said for the value of what I call “popcorn horror,” those movies that eschew all nuance for explicit depictions of carnage and social commentary. And if there is one horror movie this season that fits that bill it’s The First Purge (2018), the fourth film in the franchise that serves as its de facto origin story and explains how an America of the very near future turned to a yearly program of intentional lawlessness in order to combat cultural aggression. Directed by Gerard McMurray, the movie is a direct frontal attack on Trump’s America that pulls no punches in its depiction of class warfare. From pointedly associating the NRA with the villainous political party in power to a devious Spicer-like mouthpiece of the administration to a character literally being “grabbed by the pussy,” there is no question that this movie is designed to be a searing indictment of Donald Trump and those who support him.
How a viewer receives The First Purge is likely to depend upon where he/she falls on the political spectrum, and I suspect Rotten Tomatoes will be awash in both one star and five-star reviews. As a horror flick, the movie is slightly above average. Given that it is a prequel, it spends a good deal of the time situating and developing the characters—so much so that the actual Purge doesn’t begin until the movie’s midway point. One of the criticisms of the franchise has always been that the films advocate non-violence while simultaneously depicting in graphic fashion the spectacle of violence. But here, the opposite is true. While there are scenes of graphic brutality, it feels underplayed, especially in comparison to the other films. We’re also given heroes who understand that part of resisting is being prepared to fight back.
This review contains spoilers
In Skeletor (Rotimi Paul), a psychopathic junkie, The First Purge uses expectations as to how monstrosity usually operates in horror movies against the audience in order to highlight our own biases. With syringes attached to his fingers and a body ravaged by scars, Skeletor’s resemblance to Freddy Krueger is more than passing. Add to that his stated agenda to kill as many people as possible during the Purge’s 12-hour window of opportunity and you have all the necessary components for a horror movie monster. And yet, it turns out the real threat doesn’t originate with Skeletor but with the system that created him.
Whether it’s the decrepit low-income housing or the availability of drugs on every street corner, The First Purge pointedly illustrates the cyclical nature of poverty, particularly through Dimitri (Y’lan Noel), the local drug kingpin. His calculated violence in the beginning of the movie is directly linked to maintaining his drug empire, a point made by his activist former girlfriend, Nya (Lex Scott Davis), who derides Dimitri for causing just as much long-term harm to their community via his illicit activities as those who engineered the Purge. But Dimitri, by virtue of having grown up in the projects, isn’t interested in annihilating his community as much as he is interested in escaping the poverty. While that motivation certainly doesn’t absolve him of the crimes he commits, including murder, it does complicate his motivations which enables his ultimate metamorphosis into the movie’s anti-hero.
The First Purge suggests that Staten Island (which voted for Trump over Clinton in the 2016 election) was not chosen randomly as the test site for this social experiment but was targeted because of its racial composition. Here, whiteness is a marker of evilness just as much as wealth and power. This is true for both the architects of the social experiment as well as those militia members called in to create mayhem when the residents fail to respond violently as anticipated. Our heroes, those people standing up against the edicts of a totalitarian regime, are all people of color and suggests that this community was chosen because their economic status and racial makeup position them as disposable in the eyes of the New Founding Fathers of America (NFFA). Interestingly, this notion of expendability also finds voice in a subplot featuring two elderly women who live on the street. Both comment on being marginalized by their own community and express a desire to get payback on those who have caused them distress over the years. We see them target Nya’s brother, Isaiah (Jovian Wade), but then never hear from them again and it feels like a lost opportunity to explore discrimination within a highly marginalized community. Similarly, Isaiah’s participation in the Purge is a direct result of being publicly assaulted by Skeletor, and while elements of toxic masculinity are hinted at by those who question Isiah’s need to “save face,” it isn’t as overt as the other commentary permeating the movie.
Still, the use of race in The First Purge is effective particularly because it undoes one of the more troubling aspects of The Purge: Election Year (2016). As Dawn mentions in her piece on the film, Charlie Roan (Elizabeth Mitchell) is a particularly problematic aspect of the third film because of how her whiteness is framed in relation to the characters of color. But here, Dr. May Updale (Marisa Tomei), the architect of the Purge, is a privileged pawn of the NFFA who doesn’t realize what she has put into motion until it is far too late. It’s difficult not to read her as a stand-in for the 53% of white women who voted for Trump thereby securing his victory and her murder very much feels like a warning that those systems of oppression you support today will be your undoing tomorrow.
But here’s the thing about a prequel. We know how the story plays out and in this case, our ragtag band of survivors aren’t able to overcome the establishment of the NFFA as the Purge continues on for years to come. And it’s that final realization that truly enables the movie to land. Our survivors know what the NFFA has done but the marginalized statuses of the survivors (poor/criminal/black/latino) means that they lack both a voice and a platform by which to sound the alarm. It’s a heady indictment of conservative America and the country’s institutions that enabled a person like Donald Trump to come to power.
Help us keep the lights on and support our writers:
