I read this Letter to the Editor, written by an under-sexed and over-educated Grad student complaining about the un PC-ness of "The Return of the King" (Classism & Racism! Unambiguous Characterizations! Throbbing score!) in the Chron last week and said to self: self, you gotta snark on this letter. The thing was the more I read it, the more I realized that I couldn't actually parody it because it already verges on parody. In fact, it's already parodied here, on McSweeneys: Unused Audio Commentary By Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky , Recorded For the Felowship of the Ring DVD (I also recommend the Unused Audio Commentary By Dinesh D'Souza and Ann Coulter, Recorded Spring 2003, for Aliens Special Red-State Edition DVD to get a laugh at the polemics of the other side).

I will say this, however: I wonder what this guy takes his date when they go out to see the movies?

The good and the ugly of 'Lord'

The widespread adulation of Peter Jackson's "Lord of the Rings" movies would not be so disturbing if we as a society were less apt to conflate fantasy and reality. In fantasy, the line between good and evil is crisp, the good guys are recognizable by their good looks, and the bad guys are very, very ugly. In reality, our world is textured by ambiguity, and yet we have a president whose simplistic moral absolutism is met not with laughter but with nods of approval. "The Lord of the Rings" is not, of course, a political allegory. However, it does mirror our society's desire to reduce a complicated world into good versus evil.

Jackson's orcs have working-class Cockney accents, and the only appearance of nonwhite humans in all three films happens to be that of savage men allied with the forces of evil. This is not to say that the "Lord of the Rings" movies are classist or racist; it's just that Jackson has no problem exploiting stereotypes and prejudices to entertain us. By employing every cultural convention and archetype available, we can immediately recognize Eomer's nobility, Arwen's virtue and Wormtongue's duplicity.

The literally dehumanized orcs are homogenous and hideous, mirroring our real-life tendency to cast our enemies as less than human and less than individuals. The orcs are convenient because they allow us to delight in head chopping and limb hacking without transgressing a PG-13 rating. The martial heroes of "The Lord of the Rings," like those of "Braveheart" and "The Gladiator," don't want to fight but are reluctantly dragged into their grisly duties by the incorrigible brutality of their enemies.

Thus our upright heroes can in heart be lovers of peace, but we can still revel in the violence.

This is hypocrisy. "The Lord of the Rings" is an exceptional piece of entertainment, but in many ways it is like any other blockbuster movie in its glorification of violence. The throbbing score, the sweeping landscapes and the teary slow-motion scenes bordered by white halos all coalesce to form a spectacle as subtle as a jackhammer.

We cannot accept its crude shock-and-awe effects and totalizing vision with the unblinking praise heaped on it by most current film reviewers. Its militant subtext should prompt a wince or two, some shuffling of the feet and even a few questions about our culture, our heroes and our values.