Symbols

Watching the second Godfather movie, in which the Statue of Liberty makes a couple of important appearances. My favorite scene is where the young Vito Corleone is coming in to NY Harbor on a ship, and all the immigrants sort of hold their breaths as Lady Liberty goes by in the background. It meant something to them, hope and possibility and freedom and the future. There was a time when the SoL was the most enduring and recognized symbol of America, but it has been replaced by the Twin Towers, first in their opulence and gaudiness, then in their ruin and smoldering anger. The Twin Towers never meant much to anyone until they were destroyed, and something is deeply wrong about that. Until 9/11, they were just an expensive part of an expensive skyline, standing for nothing but commerce. That's since changed, and not, I think, for the better. Anyway, I much prefer the SoL to the Twin Towers, in either of their incarnations. Most people would say the same thing, but we are about as far away from "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free," etc etc etc as we have ever been.

This film, one of my three or four favorites, almost seems like it's taking ironic jabs at what America has become, and it was made, what, 35 years ago?