American Idol After Iraq

One of the more provocative aspects of foreign policy journalist Nathan Gardels and producer Mike Medavoy's new book, "American Idol After Iraq" (Wiley-Blackwell), is not that Obama is making this foreign policy shift, but whether Hollywood can and will change with it.

In their view, the entertainment industry has a responsibility that can't be dismissed with the notion that it is just a business. While American movies and TV shows are powerful shapers of world opinion of the United States, a fact often overlooked by professional diplomats, that reach is threatened by technology and the rise of home grown entertainment industries in other countries. Studios are well aware of it, as they have invested in local language productions around the globe, implicitly saying, If you can't beat em, join em.

They write, "These days, with ever fewer exceptions, American film makers too often grind out formulaic, shock and awe blockbusters with the proverbial gratuitous violence, sex and special effects that may be winning the battle of the Monday morning grosses, but are losing the war for hearts and minds. For all their brawn, American filmmakers, like the generals in Iraq, are in danger of losing the battle of stories that matter."

It also works the other way, as Hollywood shapes American opinion of the rest of the world. In this regard, they argue, entertainment has helped foster an insular attitude, and this lack of knowledge of other cultures is what helped enable the pre-emptive war in Iraq. A show like "24" gave a sense "that torture is necessary, and works, in the extenuating circumstances of the war on terror," a premise all the more relevant in light of Obama's release of the so-called "torture memos."

So what is Hollywood to do?

Shortly after 9/11, Karl Rove presided over a gathering of studio chiefs and major directors and writers to promote the idea of a role for Hollywood in the war in terror. Despite Rove's assurances, some viewed it with suspicion as an effort to harness the power of the industry in the same way that Hollywood engaged in a full-throttle propaganda during World War II. But nothing much came of it, as the march to war in Iraq created deep divisions between the White House and much of the industry's creative community. 

Even with the lopsided support that Obama enjoyed from the industry during the general election, he wouldn't get anywhere if he or anyone else in government tried to dictate cultural output. "What we're left with is a plea to creators of entertainment to develop a sense of propriety," former secretary of state Madeleine Albright says in the book. "They must have a civic responsibility, only with a global scope because that is the world we live in today."

Gardels and Medavoy suggest a "Council on Cultural Relations," modeled on the Council on Foreign Relations, where world leaders could interact with the creative community and push the idea of projects that educate and entertain. Obama, they says, should give a speech devoted to Hollywood to "jump start the creative community in a way nothing else could."

"Slumdog Millionaire," a global film if there ever was one, may have signaled a new willingness to look to the international scene for inspiration, but the negative images of America still endure.  Hollywood's tentpoles no doubt will enjoy huge box office worldwide this summer, but you get the sense from reading "American Idol After Iraq" that there could come a day when the industry just won't have that oomph. As they write, "America's waning soft-power has been the midwife of the new cultural self-assertion around the world."