Grasping for the Wind

In this 2-volume, 7-episode, nearly 4-hour scattershot diatribe against philosophers, artists, scientists, musicians and writers of the 18th-20th centuries, host John Whitehead leaves little doubt who's driving our little handcart on its apparently straightforward trip to hell. Subtitled "Humanity's Search for Meaning," the program tips its Christian conservative hand almost immediately when it singles out Enlightenment philosopher Voltaire (who, until his deathbed conversion to Christianity, was rabidly anti-clerical) as the beginning of the end of our long journey from absolute truth to moral relativism. After Voltaire, we find a string of usual suspects: Rousseau's noble savage, the Romantics (Lord Byron takes the knocks here), the Impressionists in art, Nietzsche (natch), Jim Morrison of The Doors, Duchamps, Bunuel, Margaret Sanger, Freud (natch), and, of course, those notable homosexuals Arthur Rimbaud and Allen Ginsberg. Ambitious as all get out, Grasping for the Wind is full of truths, half-truths, statistics from nowhere ("42% of liberals said their government was out to get them." Who did they poll? The X-Files cast?), absurd links ("besides modern art, the stock market crash undermined [American society]"), and tons of omissions, which all add up to some fairly embarrassing assertions. T. S. Elliot, who joined the Anglican church, is one of the only people singled out for praise (although what's not mentioned is that Elliot mistreated his institutionalized wife in a shabby and distinctly non-Christian way). Worst of all, perhaps, is the section spotlighting Martin Luther King, Jr.'s March on Washington, which claims that "one social upheaval led to another [from the Enlightenment on, transforming] an American society that was based on conservative middle-class values to one that was at war with its own traditions." If my memory of American history serves correctly, one of those traditions was a peculiar institution called slavery, involving the sale, exploitation and mistreatment of black people. Sure to irritate anyone with an education (and I daresay that would include a large handful of Christian viewers), Grasping for the Wind is a handsomely produced production (and a 1999 Silver World Medal winner at the New York Film Festival), but its pseudo-historical analysis is depressingly narrow-minded. Still, this should be considered a strong optional purchase if you need far right-wing Republican materials to balance out more sensible acquisitions. (R. Pitman)