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Rule 303 and political violence on filmRule 303 and political violence on film
About the author
Sam Roggeveen
Sam Roggeveen is Program Director of the Lowy Institute’s International Security Program. He is the author of The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace (Opens in new window), published by La Trobe University Press in 2023.
Political Violence at a Glance is an excellent blog and they have produced a post which I am powerless to resist: a list of the best and worst movies about political violence. I don't agree with the dismissal of The Dark Knight Rises but I did appreciate the reference to the now forgotten 1998 Denzel Washington thriller The Siege, which was indeed prescient.
I would add Breaker Morant to the list of best movies about political violence. This film is often remembered as being, like Gallipoli, a slightly crude Australian nationalist film which depicts a stuffy British officer class that treats the Australian colonials as cannon fodder. But I recall the film more as a treatise on the moral and legal ambiguities that soldiers have to negotiate in wartime.
And of course, I remember it for Edward Woodward and his Rule 303 speech.
Have at it, readers: what films would you recommend that deal seriously with the problem of political violence? Email me on blogeditor@lowyinstitute.org, leave a comment on our Facebook page or connect with the Lowy Institute on Twitter.
Sam Roggeveen