Michael Fumento

Critics have labeled the new movie "Rendition" a "political thriller." Thriller? Maybe. "Political?" Absolutely.

As I write in the NYSun, it's merely the latest in an unbroken series of major films about the war on terror that range from those seeking to assure us that Islamist terrorism isn't the threat we might think, to those depicting the terrorists as no worse than those who fight them.

Consider:

Tom Clancy's "The Sum of all Fears," when made into a film, converted Islamist terrorists into an Austrian neo-Nazi. How's that for realism? The reason for the change was an explicit kowtow to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a supporter of Islamist terror activities.

In "Babel," the accidental shooting of an American tourist is treated as a terrorist act; but in the end the only "terrorist" killed is a cute little boy.

"Live Free or Die Hard" makes you think at first that Islamist terrorists are the threats. Turns out it's an evil cyber-villain with a beautiful Kung Fu sidekick who once worked for . . . the DHS!

In "The Kingdom," we find out in the final seconds of the film that FBI agents sent to Saudi Arabia to track down the killer of 200 American civilians are on the same moral footing as the terrorists they tracked.

In "Rendition," a clearly innocent American "family man" born is Egypt is snatched from U.S. soil and shipped to a country where torture is allowed. And torture they do!

The predictable excuses don't wash.

1. "Hollywood just wants to make money. If we want to send a message, we use Western Union." Right. "Babel" lost money and so will "The Kingdom." "Rendition" is already a flop.
2. "Islamic terrorists are unsellable villains." Right. They routinely explode bombs in markets and launch chlorine gas attacks. They build torture chambers and make and display videos of beheadings in which the victim screams in agony as his head is sawed off with a dull knife. Even their foiled plots are often bizarre, such as Richard Reid's "shoe bomber" attempt. These guys are a scriptwriter's dream. Quentin Tarantino couldn't think this stuff up.
3. "We don't want to stereotype Muslims or Arabs." Right. Nobody suffers more from Islamic terror than Muslims themselves. Islamist terrorists everyday kill and maim Iraqis and Afghans. Now they've blown up at least 136 Pakistanis greeting former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. All were Muslims.

Truly, Hollywood has declared war on the War on Terror.