RUTHFULLY YOURS

I haven’t read Phillip Roth’s “Indignation,” but the most interesting and subtle part of James Schamus’ screenplay adaptation is the backstory hinted at in the shiksa heroine’s past. The characters of Marcus Messer, the brilliant college student; his over-protective Jewish father, his kvelling Jewish mother, the over-bearing mildly anti-semitic college Dean – are all stock caricatures who each gets at least one opportunity to break out of their defined molds. But the character of Olivia Hutton, the beautiful blonde co-ed who performs a first date sex act that wasn’t common in the early 50’s, is developed with snatches of dialogue that seem to have sailed over the heads of most reviewers.

We learn early on that she has spent some time in a sanitarium after slitting her wrist, an act she chalks up to her early alcohol abuse. The privileged daughter of divorced parents, she is asked to describe them to the besotted Marcus who can’t understand her performance of fellatio without even being asked. Searching for clues to what she’s about, he questions her about her surgeon father and she hurriedly and nervously slams the door on that subject. Subsequently, after Mrs. Messer meets her, she cautions Marcus about not getting involved with such a wounded soul, cleverly pointing out the power that weak people exert over others. She asks Marcus about Olivia’s family and warns him to look more deeply since any girl who has attempted suicide at a young age may have been profoundly hurt within the confines of the family itself. In addition to the contrast between the annoying yet loving Jewish father and the sophisticated but abusive Christian father, we have the Jewish mother who doesn’t respect boundaries but whose insight offers the unspoken but most plausible understanding of Olivia’s promiscuous sexual favors and recurring mental anguish.

Unfortunately, most of this movie feels dated and schematic and the title character trait quickly becomes less clever than sophomoric. Particularly jarring was the awkward plot device of how Marcus discovers what has happened to Olivia who has dropped out of school; no Dean would ever have divulged such personal and confidential material to another student. None of the actors was able to rise above the stereotypical outlines of their parts, a fact that makes you realize the world of difference between competence and charisma. Roth’s literary experiments with narrative voice and flashback are deftly incorporated into the beginning and ending of the film, leaving you with more to think about than a coming of age story during the Korean War. Roth fans will flock to see this; others can wait for it on Movies on Demand.

Bronze Star and Purple Heart recipient Captain Humayun Khan died heroically. But his exceptional courage in Iraq and his Muslim father’s post-Democratic convention histrionics on TV do not erase the security threat posed by killer warriors of Allah infiltrating our troops.

Don’t take my word for it. Ask all the forgotten Gold Star moms and dads who have lost their children because politically correct pushovers at the Pentagon looked the other way at the Muslim military menace.

Don’t take my word for it. Just re-read the ignored warnings issued by Muslim soldier Nidal Hasan, the vengeful mass murderer who gunned down 13 service members — including a pregnant private first class who lost her life and her child — and wounded more than 30 others at Fort Hood in 2009.

Two years before his rampage, while a senior-year medical school resident in psychology, U.S. Army Major Hasan delivered a 50-slide PowerPoint presentation to classmates and military superiors at Walter Reed. It was titled “The Koranic World View As It Relates to Muslims in the U.S. Military.” Quoting chapter and verse, Hasan illuminated “what the Koran inculcates in the minds of Muslims and the potential implications this may have for the U.S. military.”

Hasan cited the Verse of the Sword (“I have been commanded to fight the people until they testify that there is no deity worthy of worship except Allah”), explained “offensive” and “defensive” jihad and summarized the concept of “abrogation” — in which warring verses of the Quran trumped “peaceful verses.”

Follow the money.

Black Lives Matter was never really about protesting whatever drug dealer, robber or petty criminal was the latest to die in another violent confrontation with the police. Its founders, left-wing gay activists with a professional interest in community organizing, had little in common with the inner city criminals that they claimed to care about. Michael Brown or Freddie Gray were only their means to an end.

Black Lives Matter casually destroyed communities and then walked away to the next confrontation. The latest victim was only a means to radicalize and community organize before his t-shirts went into the trash bin and his hashtag was retired. Now the hate group has released its policy agenda.

The title, “Policy Demands for Black Power, Freedom and Justice,” puts the emphasis on the hate group’s Black Nationalism rather than any claims of police brutality. This was always about the racist agenda of “Black Power” with its mantra of separatist demands and racial entitlements.

And it’s about the money. Black Lives Matter shares the same tired old agenda as Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. In the end it’s always about a financial shakedown. And BLM has a big shakedown in mind.

Scroll down past the angry rhetoric and you wind up with “reparations” for slavery, not to mention an endless “war” on black people that encompasses everything from “mass incarceration” to “food apartheid.”

Reparations extend from “full and free access for all Black people (including undocumented and currently and formerly incarcerated people) to lifetime education” to “a guaranteed minimum livable income for all Black people.”

This would be a sizable welfare check paid out to all black people for being black.

Unlike welfare, this magic income would not be “means tested” nor would there be “any work requirements” because unlike the Earned Income Tax Credit which is “significantly tied to work, which is problematic when structural racism continues to create so many barriers to Black employment”, there would be no expectation that anyone receiving these checks do anything except watch TV all day.

But don’t get BLM wrong. It still wants to expand the Earned Income Tax Credit anyway.