At least Hollywood acknowledges the Armenian Genocide, even if President Obama won’t.
The Promise — which recently premiered at the 2016 Toronto Film Festival — is the latest historical drama directed by Terry George (Hotel Rwanda). Starring Christian Bale and Oscar Isaac, the film utilizes elegant cinematography, intense action sequences and a love triangle to address the horrific events of the 1915 – 1917 massacre of Armenians by Ottoman Turks.
Yet, although the two-year trauma was massive in scale, claiming an estimated 1.5 million lives, filmmakers have tended to shy away from portraying the events of the period on screen. According to Slate’s Matthew Dessem, the “Armenian Genocide — or as President Obama calls it, “what occurred in 1915” — has long been curiously underrepresented on film.”
The Genocide is a touchy, divisive topic, especially in this time of Middle Eastern conflict. Turkey has denied the breadth of the tragedy as well as her own culpability, infuriating Armenians. The United States needs Turkey as an ally and has thus refused to explicitly label the massacre with the “g-word.” As a result, the onus has been on the media – and stars like Kim Kardashian – to educate the public.
And that’s the main reason for George’s project – to inform the populace about the true nature of the events that occurred a century ago. “We were crucially aware of what we were trying to do,” George said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter. “So we said, let's get this thing made and put it out there, and then have the political debate and the conversation that we need to have.”
Unfortunately, although film critics were excited about the subject matter, most were disappointed with the final result. Variety’s Peter Debruge opined that “the events being considered deserve better than a sloggy melodrama” in which tragedy takes “a back seat to a not especially compelling love triangle.” The Hollywood Reporter’s John DeFore agreed. Mentioning the righteous ire displayed by American journalist Chris Myers – Bale’s character – DeFore penned: “We share his indignation [at the genocidal violence], of course, but ours is compounded by the knowledge that, a century later, Turkey continues to deny what happened here was a genocide. We just wish a better film were making this case.”
But at least it makes the case, which is more than we can say for our government’s executive branch. Debruge didn’t give Obama a pass in his review: “As broken promises go, President Obama has never followed through on his 2008 campaign pledge: ‘… As President, I will recognize the Armenian Genocide.’” Dessem was equally pessimistic. “Depressingly enough,” he wrote, “if George wants The Promise to fulfill a similar mission [as Schindler’s List did in combatting Holocaust denial], he’ll have to arrange a screening at the White House.”
