through alterations within the existingnsociahst system. Can we reaHsticallynexpect the characters in Man of Ironnto extol the glories of free-marketncapitalism?nThe rejection of communist totalitarianism,nnot the adoption of capitalism,nis the crucial issue at stake innPoland. The Polish workers know this:nthey have pitched their fight in the realmnof the spirit, not in the arena of competingneconomic systems. To fail tonrecognize this momentous fact leadsnone into the same trap that imprisonsnMarxists: philosophical—and practicaln—materialism. Man of Iron reminds onenthat in Poland freedom and tyranny arenlocked in a combat that may well determinenthe configuration of the world innwhich our heirs will dwell. With thisnmuch at stake, one had best not be disconcertednby the egalitarian and socialistnrhetoric of Wajda’s characters. Solidaritynfights our fight.nUntil fairly recently the Americannleft’s Homeric Age—the era of greatnmyths and legends with which to shapena people’s consciousness—lay in then1930’s. The eyes of aging radicals wouldngrow misty as they recalled a decadenfilled with labor strife, agitprop theaternand socialist-realist art. The decade ofnthe 30’s was the Golden Age, the timenwhen radical aspirations hovered withinnreach and the Soviet Union shoulderednher way past the tired Western democraciesnas she strode toward the future.nThe young radicals of the 1960’s rejectednthe older generation’s myth ofnthe 30’s; they turned disdainfully awaynfrom the sclerotic old men and womennwho lived on the fading memories ofnsectarian squabbles. And who could getnexcited over a dreary and spiritlessnSoviet Union that had leached the BolsheviknRevolution of its inner vitalitynand left a hollow bureaucratic shell innits stead.”nBut the American left will have itsnmyths, so in the 1970’s the dream machinenwent to work on the creation of annew Golden Age. Out of this effortnemerged the current love affair with annera bounded in time by the years 1912nand 1917 and focused geographicallynon Greenwich Village. There was a timenand place tailor-made to capture the fanciesnof today’s radicals. With Max Eastmannas the impresario, young men andnwomen from the hinterlands transformednthe Village into a three-ring circusnof free love, birth control, feminism,npacifism, artistic experimentation and ansocialism that owed more to Freud’snsexual preoccupations and Henri Bergson’snelan vital than to the turgid treatisesnof Karl Marx. The Village habituesndiscovered that socialism could be fun.nOne could labor on one’s novel in thenmorning, dash off an article for ThenMasses in the afternoon, drop by MabelnDodge’s salon in the evening to hear BignBill Haywood hold forth, argue radicalnpolitics in a Village bistro until the earlynhours of the morning and then stumblenhome arm-in-arm with the lover of one’snchoice. Perhaps the greatest source ofnsatisfaction lay in knowing how shockednthe folks back home in Des Moinesnwould be. Rarely has playing at revolutionncomported so well with the hedonisticnlongings of the young.nWarren Beatty’s Reds adds to thengrowing mythology of the GreenwichnVillage radicals by giving the left ancertified saint in John Reed, that glamorousnformer cheerleader from Harvardnwho reveled in the rapturous delightsnof the prewar Village. Why a saint.’nWell, Jack Reed sacrificed his life fornthe Bolshevik cause, a cause suffusednwith high spirits in those heady days,nand he died young, thus sparing himselfnand his worshipers from seeing thenenthusiasms of boyhood founder on thenshoals of old age. Jack could remainnever-young and ever-attached to the gloriousnupsurge of revolutionary fervor.nHad Jack Reed not existed, someonenwould have had to create him.nReds is a tour de force in radicalnmyth-making. No one really wants tonwade through Das Kapital, nor to attendnthose stodgy socialist meetings nor tonmingle with all those drab workers. Butnwhat unmitigated joy to see Reds. Itnencapsulates all one’s fantasies aboutnsexual freedom, youthful vitality andnrevolutionary romance. What adolescentnradical heart would not throb whennWarren Beatty makes love to DianenKeaton as the strains of the Internationalenfloat through their room innPetrograd.’ DnOil ihi- ilay iliar Polish scLiirir troops- i.illcd by IIK’ POIC-S in the srrccisn”Gi.’.st:ip(i.” “SS.” “”KCiB”—bii(chcTc-cl ihc miner.’; in Siltsia l>y tossini; i-xplosiv(.<ninto shafts occupiai i^y Soliilarily siipportt-rs. and while Polish intt-IU’cnHials died of a!ii-;;ecl “lieari atfaeks” in concentralion eanips set up hy CJi’neralnJani/elski’s junta, the evv York Fihii Cj-iiics Clirele voied AV(/.f ilie .Amcriiannlilni of I’XSI. The fuel thai John Kced. .AiniTican coinmunisi and ardeni pronmorerot the Russian resolution who is ylorified in till: movie as preci.sely that,nwas •i’lnuhou. ai least in part, responsihle for whaf was happening; to the Polesn(just as lie was partially responsihle for «liat hail happened before to then2().()(K).(l()() Russians who perished in the Gulays. the I lunyarians who werens!au>;hlered in 1^16, the C/eihs who were massaired in l’Xi8J snnnhnu didnnot influence ihe fritii.s” selection. Movie irilics. one must remember, arenthose upriijhi anil enlightened I’eople who lell Americans which movies arenworth seeinj;. likini; or disliking. Thev help loriii popular American fasiesnand they laundi cultural trends of rejection or acceplance. .Mosi movie criticsnare staunchly liberal, and Ihev claim to care about ihe value of the cinematicnart abine all else. DnnnMarc]i/^prill98Sn