NOTE: This article contains SPOILERS for Bushwick, a movie from 2017 you probably not have heard of until now.
So, yesterday the FBI charged a bunch of far-right domestic terrorists with planning on kidnapping the governor of Michigan, conducting a show trial, and potentially murdering her, as show trials historically do not have heartwarming underdog twists. This didn’t get enough press because reality is a quicksand field that also serves as a sinkhole for runoff from a nearby diarrhea factory. (Also, a fly landed on Mike Pence’s head.)
Yes, America kind of feels nowadays like a decomposing latex Ninja Turtle. The United States is a divided nation, meaning that a “civil war” is no longer just a thing for divorced dads to reenact, and according to fairly credible political prognosticators, far-right domestic paramilitary groupsare the country’s foremost terror threat.
The reasons being, of course, is that some are fearing that a contested election could lead to a surge of white supremacist militia violence — which wouldn’t be all that surprising seeing as armed militias have been popping up in response to protests across the U.S. and the President recently gave a shout out to The Proud Boysduring the first presidential debate. Furthermore, 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse shot and killed two people and was horrifyingly hailed as a hero by the right and even the benefactor of a crowdfunding campaign spearheaded by Christian groups, proving that we’re all living inside some kind of twisted Disney Channel reboot of Taxi Driver.
In retrospect, one recent movie was oddly prophetic about all this, anticipating the militia violence of 2020, albeit in a clumsy story featuring a former WWE star. You very likely may not have seen Bushwick, the 2017 action movie starring Dave Bautista and Brittany Snow. It didn’t even get a U.S. theatrical release and made just over $79,000 at the international box office, which isn’t a big amount for a movie not starring Kevin Spacey.
The film follows Lucy (mostly in impressive long, single-shot takes), a grad student bringing her boyfriend home to the Bushwick neighborhood of Brooklyn — likely because action movies with the word “wick” are a plus right now. Things take a turn when her boyfriend, a.k.a. Jaime from Broad City, promptly explodes upon leaving the subway.
That episode of Girls where the woman who played Peter Pan gets her butt eaten? This is not.
Lucy discovers that the neighborhood is being attacked by some mysterious paramilitary group. There are snipers on roofs, bombs being tossed from windows and random drive-by shootings. By happenstance, Lucy connects with a surprisingly jacked former military janitor named Stupe (played by Bautista) in a dank bunker, presumably because the filmmakers just assume that everyone working in the custodial arts lives in some kind of urine-soaked cellar.
“They’re invading Bushwick because they’re jealous of our rich supplies of NYU undergrads and watered-down cocaine.”read more
The Forgotten Action Movie That’s (Hopefully Not) A Prophecy Of 2020
