Buzaid- Mars Attacks

 

Tim Burton never does just comedy or just drama. I have found throughout a majority of his films that he has an odd mix of different tones. Mars Attacks is no exception. On the surface, the film is a parody. However, there’s a strong social satire that runs through the center of the film. Many can consider it to be more of a mean-streak where everyone but the "misfits" are spared. The government, the media, the military, lawyers, and rural right-wingers are just a few of the groups that are mocked and eventually killed in this film. Americans are seen as petty, opportunistic, shallow, and stupid. I found these characterizations to be funny. In a sense, Burton plays Americans (with the exception of the outsiders) to be as stupid and/or evil as the Martians. There’s no good vs. evil like in "Independence Day." I think that Burton's satiric point is that the humans are just as soulless and far-out as the Martians. They're too stunted to even react properly to the invasion; while the world is being incinerated, Vegas still packs in gamblers and show business, and the White House is still giving tours. Then there is Tom Jones, who seems ageless enough to be an alien himself, continues to croon "It's Not Unusual" even when his backup singers turn out to be barking aliens.

The one character in the film who comes across as genuinely heroic--as opposed to mock-heroic--is Lukas Haas's Richie, the Kansas slacker who, helped inadvertently by his dotty grandmother, played by Sylvia Sidney, figures out a way to burst the Martians' brains; by blasting Indian Love Song. It's probably no accident that Richie, with his shambling alertness and scraggly locks, resembles Burton. In a way, Richie brings out Burton's Boy Scout side. When, on a Kansas back road at night, a giant Martian robot clomps after the boy attempting to escape in his truck, we fear for him in a way we don't for anybody else in the movie.