Gray the Terrible

The California Recall Election seems all-encompassing right now. When watching the television news, I'm annoyed if the topic drifts to next year's presidential election, or any other topic. I've lost interest in even the existence of Europe, except, of course, for Portugal: the New York correspondent for Lisbon's Publico startled me yesterday with a surprise interview.

Last night, Turner Classic Movies presented 'Ivan the Terrible - Part I', by Sergei Eisenstein. The sumptuous movie was a delight - it must have been a monstrous undertaking in 1943, when the Great Patriotic War was raging. I soon began seeing the movie through my particular set of recall-election lenses. They say that history always repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce. Why not here?

The conflicted, but opportunistic, Prince Kurbsky (Cruz Bustamante) is forced to choose between loyalty to his stricken Tsar, Ivan the Terrible (Gray Davis), and loyalty to the ambitious boyars (Darrell Issa, Ted Costa, and others), who have their own favorite candidate for Tsar, young, feeble-minded Prince Vladimir (Arnold Schwarzenegger). Swayed by his love/lust for Tsarina Anastacia (Sharon Davis), Prince Kurbsky decides to remain loyal to his chief, Tsar Ivan, to oppose the ascendant boyars, and surprisingly, that proves to be the correct decision.

Hmmm.... The analogy is strained. Well, whoever said history has to repeat itself EXACTLY anyway. Next week, Turner Classic Movies will present 'Ivan the Terrible - Part II', the movie that got Sergei Eisenstein into so much trouble with Josef Stalin.